FG Loses N97bn Annually To Fishes, Products Imports

The minister of Agriculture and Rural development, Dr Akinwunmi Adesina, has disclosed that the Federal Government loses about N9 7billion annually in foreign exchange on importation of fish and fishery products.

The Minister disclosed this during the opening session of the 27th Annual Conference and Biennial General Meeting tagged “Bayelsa 2012”, he said plans were on to ban the importation of fishes and fishery products from Europe and Latin America due to the huge drain on the nation’s economy.

Represented by Alhaji Bukar Tijani, the Minister of State in the ministry, he said the new agenda of the Federal Government “is to promote increase in the supply of raw materials for agro-industries, employment generation, foreign exchange earners, conservation of foreign exchange through import substitution, local consumption and national food security.”

He announced that the Federal Government had also approved the sum of N17.6 billion to be shared among flood devastated states for fish and crop farmers to assuage anticipated cases of food crises.

“We can assure the people that there would not be food crises as another N9.7billion palliative for food production have been put in place,” he said.