Experts urge FG to tackle food wastage to achieve food sufficiency




An economic expert, Mr Emeka Ogbonna, has urged the Federal Government to improve food utilization through food distribution and better care practices to ensure food sufficiency in the country.

Ogbonna made the call in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja on Thursday.

He said that food wastage could be tackled with improved food processing, preservation and storage.

He described as unfortunate, situation where most times, food produced to be consumed in the country ended up as waste.

Ogbonna said that in states like Benue and Plateau, foods and fruits like oranges, tomatoes and potatoes were often left to perish.

``In this country, poor food storage of post-harvest results in the loss of up to a quarter of the food produced," he said.

Another expert, Mr Ibrahim Usman, said that food reserves should be set up to provide food security during unpredictable weather conditions that reduced food production.

Usman said that government should increase food availability and food access through improved farming systems, invigorated entrepreneurship and strengthened market systems.

He said that government could also put in place, machineries to purchase perishable goods from farmers and preserve such for future use.


``If the farmers know that their products will be purchased by the government, they will not be afraid to produce more," Usman said.

NAN recalls that President Muhammadu Buhari had while receiving Bulgaria’s new ambassador to Nigeria recently, said his administration would implement policies that would revive the nation’s agricultural sector and reposition it as its economic mainstay.

He said that the government would evolve and implement policies that would help Nigeria to become self-sufficient in food production, ``because continued importation of food can expose the country to more external shocks’’.


According to the president, the unbridled importation of food also contributes to the depletion of the country’s foreign reserves and deprives citizens of job opportunities.

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