27th April, 2012
Lagos State, southwest Nigeria, with a population of over 18 million inhabitants is no doubt the largest city in Africa. The city is faced with shortage of food production to feed its teeming populace. To meet this demand and cut short import of food from other states, the Lagos State government is putting machinery in motion to ensure that it provides for the people through the establishment of the Farm Service Centre, FSC.
Recently, the government launched the Modern Farm Service Centres across the state, starting with the Agege Farm Service Centre, closely followed by the Badagry Farm Service Centre which is nearing completion.
The FSC, formerly known as Agro Service Centre was established in the 60s as an Agro Service Inputs delivery outpost to offer advisory services as well as supply of agro inputs to farmers in the state. Over the last two decades, the functionability of the centres as a reliable source of relevant advisory services and a supplier of affordable agro inputs to farmers has declined.
In line with the renewed emphasis on agriculture and the spirited effort of the present administration to address food security issues in the state, the Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives established Modern Farm Service Centres across the state.
The Farm Service Centre, which is a one-stop shop, will offer services, such as entrepreneural/training services, skill enhancement programmes, sale of agricultural inputs, provision of market information, advisory services and bringing service closer to the stakeholders.
The Farm Service Center is a one-storey building with a beautiful landscape comprising offices for all the departments and agencies of the Ministry.
Governor Babatunde Fashola launched the FSC recently. The aim is to ensure that the needed agricultural inputs such as fertilizers and others that will help boost food production are provided for farmers, among others.
According to Fashola, the centre was established to bring service closer to farmers and other stakeholders as well as train them in a modern class room environment.
“This is the first in the series as we will decentralize agricultural services to our farmers by replicating it in the five divisions of the state to bring service closer to the people, as this centre will become a one-stop shop to help alleviate their problems, thus saving them time and money,” Fashola said.
“The centre has trained 1,000 farmers in its existence in all aspects of livestock, including poultry, piggery and snail breeding. Most of its products abound in our Farm Estates and Settlements. The reality today is that we are faced with the challenge of feeding our huge population.
“Our food security is being threatened by rising food prices, which is a major sign of food crisis in Nigeria. Between the year 2007 and 2010, prices of major staples rose by over 50 per cent. The price of rice in particular rose by over 100 per cent. In the year 2010, Nigeria was listed by the World Bank as one of the countries with the highest domestic food price increase among 58 countries surveyed by the FAO.
“Food security, which is one of the cardinal programmes of the ten-point agenda of my administration, is also an integral part of the Lagos State Economic Empowerment and Development Strategy (LASEEDS) document as well as the resolutions of the Ehingbeti Summit and the MDGs goals. It also tallies with the objectives of establishing the farm service centre to train more people in sustainable food production,” the governor stated.
“We must all be united in the quest for food security and sustainability of agricultural production by helping all stakeholders (scientists, agro chemical companies, input supply agencies, policymakers, NGOs, farmers and the food consuming populace) to find solutions to production constraints.
“I want to assure you that the Lagos State government will not only strive to feed its populace but we will also take giant strides in ensuring that by the year 2025, Lagos State produces at least 25-30 per cent of its food needs and we hope to target 60 per cent by the year 2050.
Global food security as we all know has deteriorated since 1995 and reductions in malnutrition are proceeding too slowly to meet the Millennium Development Goal ( MDG) of eradicating hunger by 2015.
It has also been discovered that three major challenges are seriously threatening to drastically complicate efforts to overcome food insecurity and malnutrition, namely: climate change, competition for food crops as a source of fuel, and soaring food prices,” the Deputy Governor, Mrs. Adejoke Orelope-Adefulire who represented Fashola said.
The governor said the recently initiated Agricultural Transformation Agenda was to turn the agricultural sector from a rural development orientation to a viable business sector, hence, the decision to implement a strategic partnership with local governments, inter-ministerial collaboration, the private sector, farmers’ group, the civil organisation groups and other stakeholders.
He added that the government had done a lot to make the transformation agenda a success, disclosing that “we have built a 20,000 metric tonnes per annum Rice Milling Plant at the Agro-Industrial Park, Imota, to boost capacity of the local rice production, and we have tremendously increased the hectarage rice plantation from 30ha to 450ha and we are planning to increase production to 1,000ha.
“A lot of work has also been done in the cassava sector of the Transformation Agenda. We have delineated areas around Ikorodu, Epe and Ibeju Lekki axis as Cassava Production and Processing Belt (CPPB), where incentives for cassava production, processing and marketing would be concentrated. This would promote employment, rural development and reduce poverty through the economics of cassava production.
“In the aquaculture value-chain, our goal is to create an enabling environment to achieve one million metric tons of fish sustainability within five years and to generate five hundred thousand jobs within Lagos State. Being the foremost state with the greatest potential in aquaculture, we have invested in areas such as hatcheries development, cage and pen culture using our water bodies, fish estate and clusters, fish processing plants, fish feed milling and inputs development, research and extension, among others.
According to Fashola, “if we go down the memory lane, we would remember the days when agricultural production was the mainstay of our economy. The advent of the oil boom changed a lot of things, and our nation that was exporting food to other nations has now become a net importer of food. With committed effort on our part, if we all agree to give our best to the transformation agenda and follow through with recommendations at workshops like the Ehingbeti Summit, the time is not far when we would be exporting food to other nations and other states in Nigeria.
Nigeria, especially the South West, is endowed with large arable land, large water bodies and productive farming population that could feed the whole of West Africa. Our people in the South West have to rise up to the constraints and challenges and grow enough food to feed the population, so that the ugly situation that occurred during the food transportation boycott of early 2010 would not repeat itself.
“Unstable and increasing food prices could result in global food crises which could affect food security and nutrition. Vigorous researches should be conducted on increasing yield per hectare from minimal land use.”
Commissioner for Agriculture, Prince Gbolahan Lawal said the Farm Service Centre was conceived out of the pressing need to expand the scope of support services to farmers in a way that is consistent with how the government of Lagos typically resolved problems confronting the state.
“At the inception of this administration, we developed a policy document for the Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives to ensure that the state’s food security goals are achieved. This policy document otherwise known as the Strategic Programme for Accelerated Agricultural Growth (SPAAG) identifies the lack of accurate, reliable and timely information to our farming communities as one of the factors militating against the growth and development of the state’s agricultural sector.
“Government remains totally dedicated towards the need to empower our farmers through knowledge impartation activities such as capacity building and training programmes but more specifically, through Farm Service Centres which would aim to provide accurate, timely and reliable information and advice to farmers on topics ranging from crop and livestock production; modern research; innovation and technology; government programmes and services and farm business management including entrepreneurial modules.
“The centre is equipped with resource personnel and specialists from the Lagos State Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives. This is how we intend to demonstrate our total commitment to the development of thriving agricultural communities that are knowledge-based, knowledge-driven and knowledge-led. It is also our hope that this will encourage and contribute significantly towards the overall development of our farmers,” he explained.
The President of Asiwaju Cams, one of the beneficiary cooperative societies, in Oke Aro, Ikeja Division, Mr. Samuel Tiwalade-Alayode said the new Farm Service Centre would relieve them of the stress, time and money of travelling down to Ojo for farm inputs.
He commended the government for the initiative and appealed to government to keep to its promise by replicating the centre in the four other divisional zones of the state.
Mr. Babatunde Shadeko, President, Imota Farm Settlement, said the society had benefited greatly from the state government through the Ministry of Agriculture and Cooperatives, especially in the supply of grains. He said with the farm service centre in all divisions of the state, services and input supply would be decentralized.
—Kazeem Ugbodaga