Former Nigerian President, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, has charged the Federal Government to focus on youths engagement in agricultural business to provide jobs and curb food insecurity.
The former president said this at Nigeria’s 9th International Trade Exhibition & Conference on Agrofood, Plastics, Printing and Packaging themed, “Nigeria’s Technology Investments: Driving growth in Agrofood, Plastics, printing and packaging” in Lagos on Tuesday.
Obasanjo stressed that if the government and the private sector could get restive youths employed, there would be less people involved in banditry, kidnapping and other criminal activities.
“With our teeming population and the problem we have of our youths going over the desert and risking their lives, what we can we do is to give them enough employments.
“The area we are sure that can provide enough employments for our youths is agricultural business.
“Even though, when we talk about agriculture not many of them will want to go to the farm, they will rather go for white collar jobs.
“However, the youth need to get their hands dirty and their feet wet in agricultural business.
“The government can improve on our security, and part of our security are the men and women that are not properly engaged or employed.
“If we are able to give them employment then there will be less of them getting involved in banditry, kidnapping and other criminal activities,” he said.
According to him, the need for agribusiness was to ensure food security, nutrition security, employment and wealth creation, poverty elimination and income generation.
“These are the reasons why we must take agricultural business serious and these are the reasons why this conference is necessary and I congratulate the organisers for it,” He noted.
The Minister of Agriculture and Food Security, Sen. Abubakar Kyari, disclosed that the federal government was collaborating with stakeholders for the necessary transformation in the food system.
“As an immediate response, we have called for partnerships across board and repurposed various interventions to help ramp up the production of staple commodities.
“This is starting with wheat in the dry season, dovetailing into rice and maize, and then to cassava and soybeans in the rainy season. These staple crops also support livestock and fisheries feed production.
“In this effort, we are building an ecosystem where each stakeholder plays a role in supporting farmers, especially small holder farmers, to improve production and productivity.
“By reaching out to our governors, we are witnessing much-needed investments and support being made across the country along different value chains.
“In this regard, we are leveraging ICT and partnering with state governments and other stakeholders to ensure we target real farmers with our support to enable actual production,” said Kyari.
The minister added that the government was also working on improving efficiency in the value chains through mechanisation.
However, the organizers said despite significant investments in local food production, Nigeria remained one of Africa’s foremost food importers and food imports were surging further.