Nigeria targets 7m tonnes rice production in 2018

Nigeria is inching closer to achieving self-sufficiency in rice production as the President Muhammadu Buhari-led administration targets seven million tonnes production of the commodity in 2018, Lai Mohammed, Minister of Information and Culture, has said.
 
Rice Mill
Mohammed who disclosed this recently in Abuja, said rice demand in the country as at 2015 stood at 6.3 million tones, adding that imports dropped from 644,131 tonnes in 2015 to about 21,000 tonnes in 2017 as a result of the success recorded by the administration in local rice production.

The minister said the interest being shown by some investors from Thailand in establishing rice milling plants in the country would not have been possible a few years ago when Nigeria was not considered a top rice producing country.

The minister noted that the massive increase recorded in volume of rice produced across the country was largely due to a successful implementation of the Anchor Borrowers’ Programme of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN).

He said “the increased rice production had, in turn, led to establishment of rice mills, including the 120,000-tonne WACOT Mill in Kebbi and the one-million-tonne Dangote Rice Mill.”

Mohammed said it had been established as fact that “locally-produced rice is safer, tastier and healthier.”  He explained that the market price of locally-produced rice would eventually come down as production increases.


He added that importing rice is currently cheaper but that government would not allow Nigeria to become a dumping ground for imported and expired rice, saying the government would never leave its food security at the mercy of other countries.

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