Cocoa body to raise production, earnings
From Bethrand Nwankwo, Abuja
AS part of efforts to ensure that cocoa farmers get higher income, the Federal Government is planning to import machines to process cocoa products in the country.
The Chairman of the Organisation and Mobilisation Sub-Committee of the National Cocoa Development Committee (NCDC), Mr. Abiodun Aluko, disclosed this at the weekend in Abuja while addressing the media on the activities of the committee.
Aluko, who is also the Deputy Governor of Ekiti State, said when the machines arrive, cocoa products would be fabricated within the country instead of exporting them raw and translating into little income to the farmers.
He advised the farmers to register their associations with the NCDC to enhance its operations especially in ensuring that the real cocoa farmers are the beneficiaries of the government's programme.
The objective is also aimed at eliminating middlemen in the distribution of agro-chemical and inputs to cocoa farmers.
According to the deputy governor, the registration and proper identification of cocoa farmers' association would facilitate the collection of data on cocoa for planning and research purposes and also ensure easy identification of the major constraints of the farmers on the field for appropriate solutions.
Aluko said: "It is a common knowledge that the Nigerian economy is largely agrarian with over 60 per cent of the active population engaged in the agricultural sector.
"An increase in cocoa production will raise the income accruable to our teeming cocoa farmers in the 14 cocoa producing states of the country and also increase the foreign exchange earnings to the Federal Government through marketing of the product at the terminal markets".
The sub-committee chairman believed that a boom in the cocoa economy would have a salutary effect on the other sectors through its multiplier effects.
These, he said, include increased employment opportunities and tremendous boom in the hospitality and banking activities.
He said Nigerian cocoa farmers lacked the financial capacity for expansion and regeneration of their plantations due to its capital-intensive nature, urging them to belong to co-operative societies to the enable them take advantage of credit facilities provided by the government.
Aluko expressed regret that Nigeria, a country which used to be one of the greatest cocoa producers in the world, could slip into irrelevance in the crop's production.
This, he said, informed the setting up of the NCDC under the chairmanship of the Agriculture and Rural Development Minister, Mallam Adamu Bello, with the mandate to ensure that the farmers operate under the most favourable environment.
His sub-committee has the mandate to identify existing cocoa farmers' associations nationwide, promote the registration of cocoa farmers at community and local council levels, encourage all cocoa farmers to belong to co-operative societies for credit and to promote the mobilisation and rehabilitation of cocoa for increased production.
On the recommendation by the NCDC, which necessitated the ban on importation of cocoa powder, cocoa cake and cocoa butter, Aluko said that the objective was to encourage the use and consumption of cocoa locally.
According to the Ekiti deputy governor, the ban on the importation of those products will lead to local consumption of 10 per cent of the products.
Meanwhile, the Federal Government has directed that 50 per cent of cocoa beverages be served in all government-organised occasions against other imported ones to further encourage the consumption of the product locally.
|
