Rice farmers score Buhari 90% on Agriculture

The Rice Farmers Association of Nigeria (RIFAN), Ondo State Chapter, has scored President Muhammadu Buhari 90 percent in agriculture, particularly in rice production and sales, in his eight-year tenure.

Mr. Francis Aileme, the state chairman of RIFAN, said this on Wednesday in Akure while assessing Buhari’s eight-year administration.

Aileme, who was also the secretary of the All Farmers Congress in Ondo State, said that many people were now engaged in upland rice farming, which was not common in the state before.

“Actually, I cannot talk about other agricultural productions, but he has done well in terms of rice production because, during his eight years in government, rice production increased and market prices also increased, which is an encouragement to the farmers.

“In the past, Ondo State grew about 1,000 metric tons of rice, but now more than that has been grown because people now see agriculture as a business due to the president’s involvement,” he said.

Aileme, therefore, called on the incoming government to check the activities of middlemen in order to boost food security in the country.

The secretary, who also called for real farmer representation in government, explained that “it is only farmers who know where the shoes pinch them.

“Let the government reach out to real farmers, not through middlemen, and this can be done when farmers have direct representation in government.

“The association also urge the incoming president to try as much as possible to involve farmers from the grassroots in his government”.

However, Mr Abayomi Monilari, President, Ondo State Farmers Congress, charged the Federal Government to shun ethnicity in order to improve the agricultural sector and better the economy of the country.

Monilari, who was also the Chairman of the All Farmers Association of Nigeria (AFAN), Ondo State Chapter, said that the eight years of President Muhammadu Buhari in the agricultural sector would have been better.

According to him, if not for ethnicity, which was introduced by some of the government agents, the present regime would have been better in the area of agriculture.

“Buhari would have performed much better in the agricultural sector, but he performed averagely because the majority of his programs were done for the northern region alone.

“The president had done a lot in the agriculture sector, but in the southern part of the country, his impact could not be felt. It was one-way traffic.

“We, in the southern part, did not really enjoy him; he performed woefully in terms of agriculture because there shouldn’t be ethnicity in government programs and empowerments at the national level,” Monilari said.

Monilari, therefore, called on the incoming administration to focus more on all sectors that would enhance and add to the country’s economy, as well as put the country in a better position in the world.