Amaka Obiefuna.

The Federal Government is poised to embark on a single digit interest rate regime as well as a $22 billion fund and land to be accessed by prospective young farmers across the country; this is part of efforts to develop the Agricultural sector,

Nigeria’s Minister of Agriculture and Natural Resources, Mr. Audu Ogbeh disclosed this at the Special Edition of the Federal Government’s Town Hall Meeting for Youths in Abuja.

Mr. Ogbeh also revealed that the Nigerian government was doing everything possible to develop the agriculture sector in a bid to make the country self-sufficient in food production and also improve on the area of food security.

“We are reforming the Bank of Agriculture to see how our farmers get a single digit interest rate in order to encourage them to keep farming because that is the practice world over. Forget some of the theories some of these foreigners throw about, in their countries they subsidized agriculture and give their farmers the best of tax holidays and incentives that naturally motivates people to go into agriculture.

For us to survive and feed ourselves as a country we must subsidize the agriculture sector. If we don’t do that, then we can’t feed ourselves and if we can’t feed ourselves, then every of our dream for greatness will come to nothing.”

The Minister said the federal government has concluded the process of certification and standardisation of Nigeria’s food produce for export.

Responding to a question of food exportation to other African countries, he said the process is covered by the Economic Community of West African States treaty but the easy way out is for Nigeria to keep storing food item in their silos for internal consumption just as it has been doing.

He gave the assurance that with the mechanisms and the bilateral MoU signed with Morocco on fertilizer production, by 2017,the prices of the commodity will drop drastically to the tune of N 5,000.

Also at the event were the Ministers of Youth and Sports Barrister Solomon Dalung who promised to hold a special youth summit to find a way to settle the leadership tussles in the National Youth Council of Nigeria and also said the Ministry was fine tuning the country’s sports policies to be in-tune with present day reality so as to achieve desired results.