Senate To Fast Track Legislations On Agricultural Production

By James Itodo

Senate says it is committed towards enactment of legislations to enhance agricultural production to ensure food security in the country

Chairman, Senate Committee on Agriculture, Senator Salihu Mustapha stated this at a meeting with Officials of the Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security and some Heads of Agencies under the ministry.

Senator Mustapha said over the years, the Senate had made several remarkable interventions and passed several laws to improve agriculture.

However, he said, a lot needed to be done to achieve the goals of re- vamping agriculture in Nigeria in a shortest time.

He said the committee would continue to collaborate with the ministry and all stakeholders to promote diversification of oil dominated economy.

This, he said would be done by upscaling agricultural productivity through viable investment and enhancing farmers’ capacity to plug into untapped opportunities across the sector’s value chain.

He also said the senate would collaborate with the ministry to boost local food production with improved innovations to produce more food for the local population and increase foreign exchange earnings and export the surpluses.

He said the Senate would ensure the reduction of soaring unemployment ratio amongst the youths through its legislative support for mechanisation to increase youths interest and attraction to the agricultural sector.

According to him, the Senate will push for implementation of the Maputo Declaration to raise the budget for the Agricultural Sector to at least 10 per cent of the national budget from the current abysmal 1.96 per cent.

The Minister for Agriculture and Food Security, Senator Abubakar Kyari said the Ministry was committed to ensuring the realisation of the renewed hope agenda of President Bola Tinubu.

According to him, six of the president’s agenda were agricultural related.

He said modern agriculture was dependent on mechanisation, technology and innovations, saying that Nigerian’s population was increasing and needed to move very smartly to achieve food security.

Edited By Grace Namiji