According to the Statistics Division of Food and Agriculture
Organisation (FAO), an intergovernmental organization of the United Nations
with over 194 member nations, the division’s mission, NaijaAgroNet gathered is to improve data collection and
dissemination for development and the fight against global hunger and
malnutrition.
These imports of
17,206,077 tonnes, NaijaAgroNet reports, came in the heels of against the total
production of 114.3 million tonnes within the period under review including both calculated and official data as at the time of
filing this report.
For the rice import in 2003, Nigeria recorded 1600701
tonnes, 1396692 in 2004, 1174071 in 2005, 974647 in 2006, 1215758 in 2007,
970787 in 2008, 1160671 in 2009 and 1882759 in 2010, while 2187419 was recorded
in 2011 followed by 2455202 a year later, just as 2187370 was the tonnes of
rice imported in 2013.
In addition, NaijaAgroNet gathered that bulk of the data were unearthed from aggregation and includes the
official, semi-official, estimated and or calculated data from the Nigerian
government by FAO.
The imported tonnes of rice, NaijaAgroNet investigations revealed
may have been "rice in milled equivalent."
Market watchers believed that despite the decline recorded by
IRERP that obviously what was gathered as official data, semi-official or even
aggregated were crossly in adequate considering the number of smuggled tonnes
and the nation’s craze for foreign products which is not alien to agriculture
produce.
This is despite the fact that most foreign rice imported into
Nigeria takes averagely three to five months to be shipped into the country,
therefore fortified thus missing relevant vitamins.
This much was what kept the cost of ‘foreign rice’ as its fondly
called locally high, even as there is allegations of such chemical used in
preserving the rice to have become instrumental to certain kind of cancer.
Noteworthy is that the
initiative on Increased Rice Production and Export Programme (IRPEP) report,
released in 2013 by the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) showed that it recorded
some accomplishments.
These comprised of the
discovery that both national and international research institutes working in
Nigeria have developed over 52 rice varieties with potential yields of 28
tonnes of paddy per hectare and maturity periods ranging from 95 to 140 days.
IRPEP records also showed
increase in the areas cultivated from 2.2 million hectare (ha) in 1999 to 2.8
million ha in 2006 and 3.2 million ha in 2007; while an increase was recorded
in annual production from 3.3 million tonnes of milled rice in 2000 to 4.2
million tonnes in 2006, and 4.8 million tonnes in 2007. Although these
represented significant increases in output, IRPEP equally highlighted that the
targets of 6 million tonnes in 2005 and 9.8 million tonnes in 2007 were not
achieved.
NaijaAgroNet further quoted
IRPEP as stating that increase in productivity per hectare as a result of the
introduction of high-yielding NERICA rice variety and R-Box technology among
others brought about the reduction in rice importation from 2.0 million tonnes
in 2003 to less than 1.0 million tonnes in 2006 and 2007, thus, conserving
foreign exchange.
Remmy Nweke/ED, Ops
... Linking agrobiz, sustainable environs, people & technologyPic: A graphic table of Nigeria's rice import between 2003 and 2013
