Alliance for Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA) says Nigeria has the potential of being the food basket in Africa.
Mrs Dorcas Mwakoi, AGRA’s Senior Programme Officer, Kenya, made this known at the National Validation Workshop for the Agricultural Joint Sector Review (JSR) Biennial Review and the Second Nigeria Agricultural Investment Plan Reports on Wednesday in Abuja.
According to her, Nigeria has the biggest land area irrigable and land that will produce food and ensure food security in Africa with the right policies in place.
“Right now Nigeria has agriculture promotion policies in place, the environment is ripe for it to happen.”
She said that there was need to partner Nigerian government to bring about transformation in the agriculture sector, adding that partners were key to agricultural transformation.
She said that AGRA was supporting countries in terms of policy and advocacy for food security in the continent.
Mwakoi said that AGRA would also partner institutions of agriculture in Africa to bring about transformation in agriculture, noting that Nigeria should be the food centre of Africa.
Mr Daniel Okafor, the representative of All Farmers Association of Nigeria, said that a lot were happening in the agriculture sector and were not being recorded.
He said that it was time the country had a record, adding that it was bad enough that the country had no data with regard to issues of agriculture.
Okafor, who also doubles as the National President, Potatoes Farmers Association of Nigeria( POFAN) said that farmers were ready to work with those handling data in the country to ensure that proper records of farm produce were kept.
