Download Opening Address by the Honourable Minister for Agriculture and

Opening Address by the Honourable Minister for Agriculture and Rural Development, Chief Audu Ogbeh at the National Summit on Cassava at the Sheraton Hotel,
Abuja on 08 September, 2016.
PROTOCOL
Thank you all for having me. Let me begin by thanking the organisers for putting this
event together. Collaborations such as these - between development organisations, international partners, the private sector and the Federal Government - are the kind that
will make a difference as we move towards a cassava sector that fulfils its potential.
At the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (FMARD), we have
recently launched a new 5-year Agricultural Promotion Policy (2016-2020) as a follow-up to the 2011-2016 Agricultural Transformation Agenda of the last administration. The two priorities we have set in our new strategic approach include: producing
enough fresh, high quality foods for the Nigerian market and serving the export market;
which will positively affect the balance of payment position of the country by reducing
the bill on food imports and by generating foreign exchange.
As we all know, the cassava industry’s potential has been hampered by the same factors
that have hindered the development in other agricultural sub-sectors, such as: relatively
low yields and high production costs, weak value chain coordination, poor infrastructure and poor access to finance.
We are also aware of government’s role has been a contributing factor in constraining
important agricultural sub-sectors like cassava. For many years, we have badly suffered
from policy instability driven by high rate of turnover of programmes and personnel,
which in turn has made the application of policy instruments inconsistent. This has led
to an uneven development in agriculture and lack of policy accountability and transparency as well as weak governance of the sector.
As you can imagine, these kinds of challenges have not endeared Nigeria to investors.
Our Ministry held two surveys of agribusiness investors in Nigeria in 2013. The results
showed that agribusiness investors identified their top constraints as: lack of government coordination; inconsistencies in policy, regulatory, laws, taxes and administrative
practices; lack of security of raw material supplies to food processors; and lack of human capital.
That is why it is good to see gathered here for the National Cassava Summit today a
mix of important stakeholders that are already playing a key role in the development
in the cassava sub-sector. It is only through multi-stakeholder engagements such as this
one that we can match strategic coordination among decision-making authorities with
common and public goals for a renewed approach to agriculture in the country. This
would also help build an evidence base to drive decision-making, as well as build on
prior successes.
I would also like to place on record that the discussions that will take place today have
huge importance for the policy thrusts of this administration, because cassava is high
on our agenda. As part of the process of improving domestic food security and boosting
export earnings, cassava is among the crops we are prioritising between 2016 and 2018,
alongside cocoa, oil palm, sesame, and gum arabic. We are focusing our policies on
the stimulation of supply and demand for agricultural produce by facilitating linkages
between producer and off-takers, mindful of the need to stabilise prices and reducing
price volatility through market-led price stabilisation mechanisms. There are many
ways in which we could potentially do this, from commodity exchanges to extended
farm-gate price under value chains coordination mechanisms and agricultural insurance, but from this stakeholder dialogue today, I hope to see the emergence of some
innovative and practical ideas on how best to stimulate supply and demand for cassava
in a way that benefits small and large-scale actors along the entire value chain.
Considering the survey on agribusiness investors that I told you about earlier, ease of
doing business has to be high on our agenda if we want cassava to be a $5 billion
industry over the next five years. This will mean addressing the areas that agribusiness
investors have said are their biggest challenges: lack of government coordination, inconsistent policies across the board; lack of security for raw materials, and lack of
human capital. To achieve this, we are working towards providing a conducive legislative and agricultural knowledge framework that includes macro—level policymaking, security for physical infrastructure and institutional mechanisms for coordination
to enhance access to adequate inputs, finance, and information on innovations, services
and markets.
It is also important to note that the ease of doing business and market access is not only
an issue for commercial players but for small agri-businesses and farming cooperatives
as well. We hope to deal with market access issues in partnership with private sector
actors, and see this Summit as an opportunity interact with key players across the value
chain in this regard. We are aware that access to finance is still an issue we need to
address; lending has increased between 1% in 2011 to ~6% in 2015, but that progress
still leaves a lot of work to be done. Based on prior discussions between CBN, the
Bankers Committee, our Ministry, and the Nigeria Incentive-Based Risk Sharing System for Agricultural Lending (NISRAL), a 10% of all formal credit provided should
go to agriculture by 2017 – 2018. Access to insurance contracts also remains a challenge. While new providers have been licensed by the Insurance Commission to retail
agricultural insurance (like IGI), Nigerian Agricultural Insurance Corporation (NAIC)
remains the dominant supplier. However agricultural insurance penetration remains
below 3% (measured by farmers enrolled and cropping area covered) versus 10% target
(using India and China as proxies) which would be a reasonable target by 2021. This
is a key factor in making agriculture a viable enterprise for our farmers, and deserves
our focus, and there will be no $5 billion cassava industry in five years without our
farmers.
As we discuss value chain development in cassava, we must also remember to discuss
post-harvest handling of agricultural produce. This way, we can ensure progressive and
sustainable expansion of agribusiness, investment and agro-processing activities in a
way that drastically reduces waste, increases food security, and makes a dent in our
import bill. Improving post-harvest handing is also important as we consider ways to
prepare crops for export and address barriers to trade. Tariff regimes are an issue, but
an even bigger barrier to exports is overcoming phytosanitary requirements set by importing countries. To overcome this challenge, we need the support of the entire value
chain of market actors, including everyone in this room and beyond.
I would like to use this opportunity to congratulate the newly formed Industrial Cassava
Stakeholders Association of Nigeria on its launch, which I am made to understand was
made to coincide with this Summit. I understand that this Association has now been
formally registered with the Corporate Affairs Commission. It is really gratifying to
note that stakeholders have mobilized themselves into a body like this to promote the
advancement of a very important value chain. Indeed, I encourage everyone with an
interest in the development of the cassava value chain to support the Association in
realising its lofty objectives for cassava development in Nigeria.
The journey of a $5 billion begins with a single step, and we are here to take that step
together. Our Ministry is here to listen and learn of innovative ways in which we can
collaborate to address the challenges ahead. We will not go far in surmounting the
challenges facing the cassava value chain if we attempt to go it alone. That you all are
here shows that you know this as well as we do.
With that, I welcome you all to the National Cassava Summit and wish you all fruitful
deliberations.