The state of the agricultural sector in Benue State is a microcosm of the challenges and opportunities facing the broader sector nationally. Hence, solving the food crisis in Benue could go some way towards solving the food crisis in Nigeria.
In the run-up to the 2023 presidential elections, social media was filled with incoherent ramblings about corn, or agbado, by Nigeria’s new president, Bola Tinubu. By putting together bits and pieces from several campaign speeches with an 80-page manifesto which left a lot to be desired, we can safely deduce that the new government claims to have ambitious, albeit unclear, plans for the agricultural sector. The sector, which contributes 25 per cent to Nigeria’s GDP and employs 40 per cent of its population, is in a dire state as a result of severe domestic and international shocks since the presidency changed hands in 2015.
Several events have resulted in a food insecurity crisis which should be of utmost priority to the new government. Security issues such as the Boko Haram insurgency, banditry and herder-farmer conflicts have severely affected agricultural productivity in key states, disruption of global supply chains initiated by the COVID-19 pandemic and exacerbated by the Russia-Ukraine war have exposed the extent of the country’s dependence on imported food items, and the worst bouts of flooding in recent memory have led to widespread destruction of farmers, farmlands and farm produce. Although almost all states have been affected by at least one of these unfortunate events, their combined forces have converged to devastating effects in one particular state: Benue State...
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