By Ayo Akinfe
[1] Local governments will be obliged to organise their farmers into cooperative units
[2] Farmers will be encouraged to sell their produce, buy seedlings, pesticides and fertilisers, as well as farming equipment through their co-operatives to maximise efficiency and overhead costs
[3] Every local government must build at least one food storage facility within its domain
[4] An agricultural tax will be paid to the local government to help provide and maintain the necessary services to support farming programmes
[5] Agricultural cooperatives will be encouraged to move into value-added activities and will be provided with loans to facilitate this
[6] A national bank of agriculture will be established to offer single digit interest loans to farming cooperatives at competitive rates
[7] Farmers will be encouraged to venture into organic agriculture because of the high premiums that this commands
[8] Cooperatives will be encouraged to buy their members high-yielding hybrid seedlings to enhance unit-per-head output
[9] Seed companies will be offered tax holidays to come and set up plants and facilities within Nigeria
[10] Processing companies and food manufacturers like Cadbury, Nestle, Mars, Kelloggs, Tate & Lyle, Unilever etc, will be encouraged to establish plants in Nigeria to facilitate vertical integrated production. Our ultimate goal is to export finished, packaged and shelf-ready products to international markets.
