How To Banish Hunger From Nigeria

A professor of Agricultural and Biosystems Engineering at the University of Ilorin, Kayode C. Oni, has decried the state of food insecurity and hunger in the country, just as he has suggested ways of redeeming the situation.

Oni gave this insight while delivering a lecture, Man, Machine and Food Insecurity, recently at the University of Ilorin.

According to the don, who is the immediate Chief Executive of National Centre for Agricultural Mechanisation (NCAM), despite the huge endowment of human and natural resources in Nigeria with N2.4 billion generated daily from the sale of crude oil alone, millions of Nigerians still go to bed hungry.

Agreeing with Ban Ki-moon, Secretary-General of the United Nations, that hunger is a weapon of mass destruction, Oni highlighted how poverty and hunger have wreaked havoc on human civilisation.

“The decadence of ancient civilisation was largely due to inadequacy of man’s tools to supply man’s needs. Food was never available without work or abundant food without machine,” the don noted, tracing parlous state of agriculture development which is a counter force to food insecurity to the crudity of agricultural mechanisation sub-Saharan Africa, including Nigeria, saying “the level of mechanisation makes the difference.”

“In sub-Saharan Africa, there were, in 1980, only two tractors per 1,000 hectares, whereas Asia and Latin America had 7.8 tractors. In 2003, the number for sub-Saharan Africa shrunk to 1.3 tractors while that for Asia and Latin America increased to 14.9 tractors. In 1960, Kenya, Uganda and Tanzania each had more tractors in use than India. However, by 2005, India had 100 times more tractors than all three countries combined,” he said.

Describing the situation in sub-Sharan Africa as worrisome as a result of heavy reliance on human muscle as “the greatest source of power on the farm,” Prof. Oni noted that food security is hampered in Nigeria by such factors as “availability of raw materials, environmental regulations, research, technology and technical support for agro-industrial development, absence of good management and nonexistence of market development strategy, seasonality of crops, inappropriate or obsolete processing and ancillary equipment and mitigating food insecurity through equipment development.”

The Kansas University-trained scholar suggested that for Nigeria to attain food sufficiency, a balance must be struck between man and machine.

Specially, he recommended that to rescue Nigerians from the tight grip of hunger, there must be partnership between government and the private sector as done in Kwara State, an enabling environment for agricultural development must be created and more attention should be given to sustainable raw material production and research, while development support for agro-industries need be provided.

Stressing the need for appropriate machines to transform the agricultural sector and combat food insecurity. Prof. Oni tasked the stakeholders on the collation and analysis of shelf sitting machines and equipment, pilot testing of identified machines and equipment standardisation, product development, machines and equipment certification, component specialisation and equipment manufacturing, machines and equipment commercialization, fabrication improvements, agro-industries technology value chain analysis as well as servicing and maintenance backup.