Boosting domestic food production key to curbing inflation – Expert
The Group Chief Executive Officer, AFEX, Ayodeji Balogun, has expressed concerns over rising food prices in Nigeria and in Africa.
This is as he highlighted key steps economic managers can follow to stem food inflation in the country.
Balogun, speaking on Wednesday, during the Chief Executive Officer Breakfast domestic markets edition, said if Nigeria can produce enough food and control the cost of production, it will be easy to control prices of food prices to a point where every Nigerian can afford three square meals affordably.
Indeed, food inflation in Nigeria has surged to unprecedented levels, reaching 40.9 per cent in June 2024, a significant rise from 25.3 per cent the previous year.
Reports say inflation is driven by several factors, including soaring transportation costs, currency depreciation, and disruptions in food production due to insecurity and climate change.
“Economists will say inflation is reducing while food prices are still higher, but truly, the first step is to stem inflation which I think the government has been successful in addressing and the next step is to ensure that food comes at a reasonable price.
“If we can produce our food and control the cost of production and produce enough, then we can control the prices to a point where every Nigerian can have their three square meals affordably. I think getting into that point is where we are going to and it is the effort and primary responsibility of the government and what all industry players are here to think through and help them articulate,” he said.
According to him, the greatest challenge hindering Nigeria’s agricultural sector is the nation’s inability to meet the growing demand for food, saying that Nigeria’s population is growing faster than the food the nation is currently producing
“We are not producing as much as we can and Nigeria is very big and we are growing at 3 per cent while our food is growing at about 1 per cent and if you do the mathematics you will see that after like 10 years of that, you will start to see the gap and the gap is widening.
“The fact that our food is the cheapest across the Sahel region, so many countries are taking and eating it and we do not have enough to supply and that is the angle that is really driving food prices.
“We really need to produce more food, our demand is good and there is no reason why Nigeria cannot become the power house for agriculture for West Africa and the way Brazil is supplying the whole of Europe, Nigeria can also be the ones supplying the 500 million people in West Africa, but then we have to produce the food, but I think the mission and ambition of President Bola Tinubu to create a N1 trillion economy, must start from how can Nigeria produce a 100 million tonnes of food from the 40 million tonnes we are producing currently,” he stated.
He said the essence of the breakfast meeting was to bring industry players as well as representatives of governments to think about the future of food security in the country.
“We are here to identify the current happenings with production, what is the forecast for commodities in the next months that are coming and how can industry players come together to support government’s strategy to ensure that the government has enough food for everybody both for the industry and for raw materials while suggesting ways on how to address issues hindering food production in Nigeria,” he added.
