The Rice Farmers Association of Nigeria (RIFAN), Lagos State Chapter, has called for collaboration to increase rice paddy availability.

RIFAN chairman Raphael Hunsa made the call in an interview on Monday in Lagos.

Mr Hunsa ‌⁠‍‍⁠⁠‌‍⁠‌‍⁠⁠‌said the unavailability of rice paddy was largely caused by hoarding by unscrupulous middlemen.

He, however, stressed the need for collaboration among key stakeholders in the subsector to increase paddy availability and boost local rice production.

“To make available rice paddy for the country, every sector must work together in unity, or we may all suffer the consequences.

“Government agencies, stakeholders and farmers must work together to ensure enough increased availability of the produce in order to boost local rice production.

“The important thing we ought to understand is that we cannot hoard rice paddy and expect to have increased local production of the produce. Hoarding rice paddy as some political farmers do will only result in it getting rotten and unusable at the same time,” he said.

According to Mr Hunsa, the federal government is making efforts to ensure sufficient rice paddy availability, but middlemen remain a major challenge in the subsector.

“Most times before the rice paddy gets to the farmers, they are already bad and subsequently cannot be cultivated.

“There are some federal ministries of the government saddled with the responsibility of distributing over 5,000 tonnes of rice paddies to local farmers this year.

“But upon delivery, we couldn’t make use of them. We were given the paddies gradually, and over the months the rest were wasted at the ministry. This is not good at all, and most times they place the fault on farmers, but farmers are on top of their game. We cannot cultivate what was not delivered at the right time,” Mr Hunsa said.

He urged the federal government to channel its interventions directly to farmers through their associations.

“Whatever the federal government wants to give to the farmers should come directly to the farmers and at appropriate times, through their associations. Planting seasons must be strictly adhered to if we are to get the best out of the available resources the government provides.

“I want to urge the government that when they have available rice paddy, let them distribute it to the farmers at the appropriate time. Rice cultivation is time-bound; it has its period. We want the government to help us so we can have available and affordable rice at all times.

“We can grow to a point where we will be able to have our home-grown rice paddy if we are consistent with what we have. We must always have rice paddy reserves, so we won’t need to depend on external sources for rice paddies,” he said.

(NAN)