Edo Farmers Demand Urgent Measures To Curb Food Crisis

Farmers in Edo State have called on the Federal Government
to take urgent measures to avert imminent food crisis as a result of flooding
in parts of the country.

Coordinator, All Farmers Association of Nigeria (AFAN),
Alhaji Abdulahi Mohammed, in Edo North Senatorial district, made the call in an
interview with newsmen in Auchi.

Mohammed observed that the floods had destroyed hundreds of
hectares of farms in the state, adding that “even, the few farms that may have
been spared, will have poor harvest”.

According to him, in Edo North alone, the flood destroyed
all farmlands in Etsako Central, Etsako East and Esan South-East Local Government
Areas.

He explained that rice, yam and cassava farmers were mostly
affected by the flood.

“Without rice from Udaba, Udochi and Anegbette in Etsako
Central, yam and cassava from Etsako East and Esan South East, there will be no
food in the state.

“It is, therefore, urgently imperative on government to find
a lasting solution to the problem to avoid serious food and health crisis as
well as social problems”.

Similarly, an extension agent with Edo Agricultural
Development Programme (ADP), Mr Ekins Jimoh, called for financial grants and
farm inputs to farmers in the state to reduce the effect of the flood disaster.

Jimoh said, “all the farmers need from the federal and
state governments now are farm inputs like seedlings, fertilisers and tractors
to assist them to get back.

“The farmers lost all they had laboured for throughout the
year to the flood, and in order to encourage them to cope with the situation,
government should, as a matter of urgency, come to their aid”.

It would be recalled that more than 20 communities in the
three affected council areas in Edo North were submerged by water from River
Niger.