Nigeria losing high volume of annual farm produce to pests Agric Minister

The Minister of Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, Dr Mohammed Abubakar, has said that Nigeria is losing high volume of its annual farm produce to damage from pests.

Abubakar made this known at a ministerial press briefing on Monday to mark the International Day of Plant Health 2021 in Abuja.

“These plant health threats undermine food security and increase vulnerability of livelihoods dependent on crop value chains, healthy plants mean a thriving economy,” he said.

According to him, one of the challenges in plant health is the uncontrolled use of plant protection products such as the use of sniper and other lethal chemicals to store food products, which he said was dangerous and deadly.

The Director-General of NAQS, Dr Vincent Isegbe,  pledged  that the quarantine service would continue to maintain plant, animal and fish health to meet international standards and help generate economic growth.

He said “Nigeria is blessed with different agricultural produce and we can make money from them when we export them but there was need to subject the goods to pre-requisite quarantine inspection and certification before dispatch.

”But the problem is that other countries come to Nigeria and buy of agricultural produce  such as ginger, garlic and so on then go to repackage them and export them.

“We want to work with stakeholders along the value chain to ensure that Nigeria agricultural produce make it out and this will help us generate money for Nigeria and our farmers,” he said.

He said most of the medicinal plants we export need to be grinded and packaged before exporting otherwise they would be prohibited

He said the EU accepts both live and frozen agricultural produce provided they are free from pests and diseases, adding that NAQS always ensures that all export-bound agricultural produce are properly processed in line with good hygienic practices