The Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry, LCCI, has said that the farmers in Nigeria needed no external financial support to grow their farming businesses.
However, the OPS’ group pointed out that what the farmers required are technology and training, especially from foreign supports and that they can multiply their productions with their little fund if properly trained and equipped.
The chairman, Agric Group, LCCI, Adeola Elliot, who made this known at a panel discussion at the 2016 LCCI International Investment Conference, said Nigeria was not a poor country to be depending on the financial aid from foreign country, arguing that only the poor countries could be seeking foreign aid to grow.
Speaking on the topic “Investment Opportunities in the Commercial Agricultural Sector in Nigeria”, Elliot said there were many ways by which small scale farmers could grow without depending on financial aid from any financial institution or foreign helps. He argued that what Nigerian
farmers lacked was not financial power per se, but technological power and good training.
He declared that the Chamber, having found out the challenges, has created a platform through which small scale farmers were gathered to be trained and supplied the needed technologies. He added that the Group has been acquiring lands from various local governments for the use of those small farmers in order to boost agricultural sector in the country.
Reacting to a question on whether or not the European Union could help Nigeria develop its agriculture and manufacturing sector in order to be part of the EU Economic Partner Agreement, the agribusiness expert argued that the country did not need any foreign investors to help in the development of the local agric sector, saying that Nigerians could do it themselves.
He disclosed that the LCCI Agric Group had been working with the big companies within the country and some foreign countries on how its farmers members could be trained on the best modern ways to farm and supply of needed technologies for its members.
Meanwhile, the moderator of the discussion, Mr. Emmanuel Ijewere, who identified lack of storage facility in Nigeria especially refrigerator, said Nigerian farmers produced about 130 per cent of what the country need to consume but about 60 per cent got perished before they got to the market.
In support of this submission, one of the audience, an agribusiness woman said most of the times when she was transporting her goods from South-south to Lagos, she would be stopped at almost 30 checkpoints where her goods would be ransacked by various security personnel and before she could take the goods to Lagos, most of them would have spoilt.
Ijewere therefore called on LCCI to, as a matter of urgency, file formal complaints of those farmers about their constant encounters with the security men on the so called checkpoints across the country and table the complaints before the governments at various levels and the legislators in order to find solution to the challenge.