Business

FG To End Hunger Among 13m Nigerians

Published

11 years ago

July 5, 2013

The Nigerian Government has announced plans to expand the use of bio-fortified crops, such as pro-vitamin ‘A’ cassava and orange-flesh sweet potato to address the hunger situation being faced by some 13 million people.
Nigeria’s Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Dr Akinwunmi Adesina, gave the indication on Monday in Addis Ababa at the High Level Meeting of AU Heads of State and Government on “unified approach to end hunger in Africa by 2025.
The African Union, FAO and the Lula Institute jointly convened the meeting with a theme “unified approach to end hunger in Africa by 2025”, within the Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP) framework.
Adesina said, “much progress is being made, we are mindful that we still have challenges of malnutrition and micro-nutrient deficiencies to tackle.
“Nigeria still has 13 million people suffering from hunger and malnutrition is still high”.
Adesina said that Nigeria had made good progress in the target set to produce an additional 3.2 million metric tonnes of rice paddy to attain self-sufficiency in rice by 2015.
“We have already unleashed a rice revolution in Nigeria and produced 1.8 million metric tonnes of rice paddy within two years.
“This is 55 per cent of the target set for 2015 as in the dry season of 2012 to 2013; we produced a record 1.1 million metric tonnes of rice.
“This created 460,000 jobs, especially for the youth. Farmers net incomes increased by an estimated 200 million dollars, creating wealth for farmers and their communities.”
According to him, Nigeria has ended the approach of taking agriculture as a development programme, saying “we treat agriculture as a business.
“We should not manage poverty with agriculture; we should create wealth through agriculture,” Adesina said.
He said in the past year, Nigeria had leveraged eight billion dollars in private sector investment commitments.
“In the past six months, we have received letters of private investment commitments worth 3.3 billion dollars.
The minister said Development Partners were supporting the Federal Government’s Agricultural Transformation. Agenda with more than two billion dollars in financial commitments from the World Bank, African Development Bank, DFID, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, IFAD, UNDP and USAID.
“In Nigeria, as long as any Nigerian goes to bed without food, our job is not complete.
“We will not relent until we end hunger in Nigeria. For the ‘democracy of the stomach‘ is the right of every Nigerian,” he said.
The minister said social transfer programmes, such as school feeding and conditional income transfers would be expanded.
He said the Federal Government’s save one million lives initiative programme would tackle child malnutrition through community-based management of acute malnutrition and integrated young child feeding programme.
“In 2012, over 400,000 severely malnourished under-five children were treated. We are also promoting exclusive breast feeding for infants through the age of six months.
“Nigeria welcomes the new Partnership for a Unified Approach to End Hunger.”
The minister noted that the experience of Brazil, under the leadership of former President Lula, clearly showed that where there is a will, there is a way.
We welcome the idea of the Africa Solidarity Trust Fund and are currently considering our possible role and contribution to the Fund.
The minister said government had embarked on reforms on fertiliser and seed policies to accelerate the access of millions of farmers to improved technologies.
“To better target our farmers and eliminate corruption in these sub-sectors, we developed an electronic wallet system of providing farm inputs to farmers using electronic vouchers on mobile phones.
“Nigeria is the first country in Africa to develop such a system. In 2012, we reached 1.5 million small scale farmers with the electronic wallet system. This improved food security for an additional 7.5 million persons within the farm households.”
He said Nigeria launched a national database for farmers, where 4.2 million farmers were registered last year, while 10 million farmers had so far been registered in 2013.
“We plan to provide 10 million farmers with seeds and fertilisers and assure food security for 50 million persons by 2015.’’
The meeting is being attended by some 15 AU Heads of States and Government as well as international experts on food security, non-state actors, Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) and Women groups in the agriculture sector.

Business

Fuel Scarcity: IPMAN threatens shutdown over bridging claims

Published

17 hours ago

May 3, 2024

The Tide

The Independent Petroleum Marketers Association of Nigeria (IPMAN) Depot Chairmen Forum, has exonerated its members from the current fuel scarcity in the country.

According to IPMAN, this is caused by its inability to source petroleum products.

The IPMAN Depot Chairmen Forum also threatened to withdraw its services over non-payment of N200 billion bridging claims by the Nigerian Midstream and Downstream Petroleum Regulatory Authority (NMDPRA) to its members, since 2022.

Alhaji Yahaya Alhassan, the Chairman, of the Forum said this while briefing newsmen in Abuja, yesterday.

Alhassan said the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPC Ltd.) was the sole importer of the product, but the marketers could not source products from NNPC Ltd. deport, rather from the private depots at high rate.

“We cannot buy fuel from the private depots at N950 and transport the product from Lagos to the North and other parts of the country with N2 million and still sell it at N900 or N1, 000.

“It is expedient for us to state that we are more pained by the non-availability of petroleum products in the country, which has given rise to another round of untold hardship for Nigerians.

“Contrary to claims that IPMAN members are hoarding Premium Motor Spirit (PMS) known as fuel, we would like to categorically state that PMS scarcity is wholly triggered by inability to get fuel from NNPC and not IPMAN,’’ he said.

Meanwhile, the NNPC Ltd. Chief Corporate Communications Officer, Olufemi Soneye said the disruption was due to logistical issues which had since been resolved.

“We currently have an availability of products exceeding 1.5 billion litres, which can last for at least 30 days. Unfortunately, we experienced a three-day disruption in distribution due to logistical issues, which has since been resolved.

“However, as you know, overcoming such disruptions typically requires double the amount of time to return to normal operations.

“Some folks are taking advantage of this situation to maximise profits. Thankfully, product scarcity has been minimal lately, but these folks might be exploiting the situation for unwarranted gain,’’ Soneye said.

He however, said the lines would clear out soon.

On the non-payment of bridging claims, the IPMAN forum said it was distressed and depressed by the laidback attitude of the NMDPRA towards the survival its member’s businesses, arising from its refusal in paying the claims.

“It is with deep frustration that we have assembled here today as the IPMAN Depot Chairmen Forum. It is also disheartening to note that some of our members have completely shut down businesses and retrenched employees.

“As businessmen and women, our members acquired bank loans to keep their fuel retail outlets running on a daily basis across the nooks and crannies of Nigeria in order to serve the teeming population of Nigerians,’’ Alhassan said.

He recalled that Sen. Heineken Lokpobiri, Minister of State Petroleum Resources (Oil), at a stakeholders meeting in February mandated the NMDPRA management to clear the entire debt in 40 days.

“However, today, we have crossed the 40 days’ time lapse given to the NMDPRA to clear the debt, and it is shameful to state that only the paltry sum of N13 billion has been paid, ignoring minister’s directive.

“We are not happy with the indiscriminate increment in the issuance and renewal of Sales and Storage Licence, by the NMDPRA, and the subsequent delays in acquiring the licence, which our members are recently subjected to.

“We are also calling on President Bola Tinubu to look into this unwholesome figure which is highly detrimental to our business and reverse it forthwith, as it is bound to impact negatively on the masses.

“We are poised to take far reaching decisions that may cripple the supply and sales of petroleum products across Nigeria if our demands are not met within the shortest period of time.

“We are collectively prepared to withdraw our services, shut down every single outlet, and suspend lifting of products forthwith till our demands are fully met, and the consequences will be terrible.

“We call on our members to however remain resolute and law abiding, even as we draw close to the immediate ultimatum for our demands to be met by the NMDPRA,’’ the chairman said.

Reacting to the IPMAN’s claims, the Acting Head, Corporate Communications, NMDPRA, Seiyefa Osanebi said the bridging claims payment was ongoing.

“The bridging claims payment is always an ongoing process,” she said.

Maritime

Shippers’ Council Registers 160 Port Operators

Published

5 days ago

April 29, 2024

The Tide

The Nigerian Shippers Council (NSC) says it has registered 160 Port stakeholders into its Regulated Port Service Provider and Users platform since the initiative began in 2023.
Executive Secretary, NSC, Mr Pius Akutah, made the disclosure on the sideline of a sensitisation programme by the commission for port operators in Lagos, with the theme, “Regulated Port Service Provider and Users”.
Represented by the Director, Consumer Affairs, Chief Cajetan Agu, Akutah emphasised the significance of the programme for stakeholders.
He said the sensitisation programme was the second edition after its commencement during the last quarter of 2023.
The Secretary said the 160 registered port operators consist of agencies, terminal operators, shipping companies, individual port users as well as service providers.
“We invited the ports stakeholders for enlightening them on the processes for online registration of Regulated Port Service Provider and Users.
“We have demonstrated to them how to register and how to make payment and we were able to present before them the various categories of the registration.
“The rate of payment is also in the registration. The payment of each group depends on the operation. A shipper pays N30,000, terminal operators and shipping companies pay N300,000, truckers also pay N30,000, while some pay N50,000 and N100,000.
“The Council was able to intimate them on the benefits, because port users benefit more as we help to interface on reducing port charges from time to time”, Akutah said.
He said that there was a need to continue to work with port operators to stop delays and eliminate high costs to make the port efficient.
Also speaking, the Deputy Director, Stakeholders, Service, NSC, Mr Celestine Akujobi, said “the sensitisation exercise was important for the council to enable us bring all the port stakeholders together”.
According to him, this is to avoid challenges during the implementation of the council’s responsibilities.
“By the time we introduce sanctions on defaulters, no operators will complain that he or she is not aware of the registration.
“I’m happy with the turnout of this sensitisation. This shows that the operators are well informed of the statutory friction of the council as the port regulator.
“The final implementation will commence as soon as we discover that all the operators have keyed into the portal.
“We are engaging other ports across the country and we’re hopeful that before the last quater of 2024, the council will implement sanctions on defaulting operators”, Akujobi said.
Earlier, Vice Chairman, National Association of Government Approved Freight Forwards (NAGAFF), Dr Ifeanyi Emoh, said port challenges were enormous, adding that they originated from some of the government agencies.

Emoh urged the council to look into regulating other government agencies, so that there could be a window through which they can collect port charges collectively instead of indiscriminately.

By: Chinedu Wosu