Nigeria is a richly blessed country with an abundance of natural capital which is also known as natural resources. The most prominent and abundant of these natural resources is the availability of vast land which has the potential to support an even larger variety of agricultural activities such as crop production which includes the production of tree crops, cash crops, horticulture, timber and wood.
Livestock production, wildlife and aquaculture are also highly supported. It is a shame however that despite the availability of such natural resources that Nigeria is still considered a developing country with a vast majority of its citizens living from hand to mouth and in some cases, going through extreme poverty.
A lot of factors are responsible for this with poor policy formulation and implementation being some of the major factors, which has resulted in the under-utilisation and poor management of these natural resources.
A policy is a deliberate plan of action to guide decision making. It is a set of principles guiding the actions of members of an organization or country. Laws differ from policies as laws can be enforced and used to compel, while policies are merely used to guide the decisions and behaviours of people. Thus, to be effective policies have to be well thought out.
Agricultural Policies in Nigeria
Agricultural policies in Nigeria can be broadly grouped into the colonial and post-colonial era.
Colonial-era includes:
- Forest policy (1937, 1945)
- Agricultural policy (1946)
- Policy for marketing oils, oilseeds and cotton (1948)
- Forest policy for the western region (1952)
- Farm settlement scheme (1959): the main objective of this policy was to settle young school leavers in a specified area of land and encourage them to carry out agricultural activities thereby preventing them from moving to urban areas in search of white-collar jobs. They were also to serve as models to emulate for other young school leavers.
This is an example of a policy that was not properly conceptualised as things did not go according to plan. Most of the young school leavers were not experienced farmers hence agricultural output was low thereby leading to dropouts from the scheme. Secondly, there was a lack of understanding among the participants as they believed it was a way to get white-collar jobs.
Post-colonial era: some of the policies in this era include
- Agricultural Development Programme: this was established in 1974. It was based on collaborative efforts of the federal government, state government and the World Bank. It has grown to become one of the biggest and most effective agricultural development programmes. Its objective was to improve agricultural productivity by sustaining domestic food supply through a massive infusion of funds acquired by the World Bank. It, however, ran into challenges due to dwindling oil prices in the international market.
- Operation Feed the Nation: this was established in 1976 by the General Olusegun Obasanjo military government and it aimed to improve agricultural productivity in the nation by encouraging participation of every citizen in agriculture. The federal government provided inputs at subsidised prices and under this programme, every available piece of land was used. Failure of this programme was caused by little or no farming experience by farmers, an abundance of food in the market leading to a market glut and incidence of diseases which affected livestock production.
- Better Life Programme for Rural Women: was established by Mrs Maryam Babangida (First Lady of the Federation) in 1987. The programme was aimed at encouraging rural women towards improving their standard of living, raising consciousness about the rights of women and improving social, economic and political opportunities and responsibilities of women.
- Root and Tuber Expansion Programme: this was launched in 2003 by President Olusegun Obasanjo’s administration. It covered 26 states and aimed to address food production and rural poverty. It was meant to improve and stimulate the demand for cheaper staple food like yams, cassava, potato as opposed more expensive carbohydrates such as rice. Smallholder farmers with less than two hectares of land per household were the targets of the programme with special attention directed towards women who play a significant role in rural food production, processing and marketing. (read the history of agriculture in Nigeria)
Challenges of Agricultural Policy Implementation
The following are challenges of the implementation of agricultural policies in Nigeria.
- Inconsistent governments, with each government developing their own policies instead of continuing the existing one.
- Corruption
- Lack of adequate skill to implement formulated policy a fall out of not thinking through the impact and sustainability of the policies.
- Top-down method of policy formulation
- Lack of continuity of agricultural policies
- Poor monitoring and evaluation mechanisms
- Poor market structure
Written by Alahira Jeffrey
Reference
Uche, I., P. (2011) The Impact of Agricultural Policies on Nigerian Economy. Dept of Public Administration and Local Government. University of Nigeria, Nsukka.
Oluwafemi, R., A. (2017) Agricultural Policy Formulation and Implementation in Nigeria – Issues and Challenges. International Journal of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources. 2017; 4(2): 9-14
Iwuchukwu,J., C. and Igbokwe, E., M. (2012) Lessons from Agricultural Policy and Programmes in Nigeria. Journal of Law, Policy and Globalization. ISSN 2224 -3240 (paper) ISSN 2224-3259 (online). Vol 5, 2012