THE Minister of Agriculture, Dr. Akinwumi Adesina, has said that during his tenure as Minister of Agriculture, there are certain things he won’t allow to continue or happen. Below are some of the resolutions he made recently:

“Nigeria accounts for 60 per cent of oil palm production in the world, 30 per cent groundnut oil production, 18 per cent cocoa production, yet, 70 per cent of our population are living on a less than two dollars a day.

“Honestly, Nigeria should not be a museum of poverty in the midst of plenty. To me, agriculture is a business and not a project or programme and our farmers should be able to compete both in the local and international markets.

“Nigeria is now number one importer of tomato paste from China and other nations. Why? We have to stop this anomaly as well as stop doing what I called Felele agriculture in Nigeria.

We are spending N271 billion annually on the importation of sugar, N365 billion on rice importation, N7 billion on fish, N635 billion importing wheat we are making farmers in other countries of the world rich, while our own farmers are getting poorer. Nigerian farmers have become an abandoned project, they don’t get the needed support and assistance and the situation of our farmers is like putting somebody inside a rickety boat, paddled him into the centre of the Atlantic Ocean and abandoned him there, asking him to survive on his own.

“Today, Nigeria produces 45 million metric tonne of cassava, yet, we can’t boast of much in terms of value addition. Therefore, the transformation agenda is real and we are fully committed to it.”