The International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) has identified Nigeria as Africa’s agro-industrialisation powerhouse.

Katherine Meighan, the associate vice president and general counsel for IFAD, said this at the ongoing Strategic Partners and Investors Forum on launching the Special Agro-Industrial Processing Zones (SAPZ) in Abuja.

Ms Meighan said Nigeria was blessed with fertile land, a vibrant young population and over 88 per cent of arable land. She further said that 75 per cent of the country’s population is younger than 24 years old.

According to her, Nigeria has the largest gross domestic product (GDP) and the largest population in Africa. She added that Nigeria is well-positioned as a powerhouse for agro-industrialisation across the continent.

“Smallholder farmers, which constitute 70 per cent of Nigerian farmers, are the key to this transformation. Together, they produce up to 90 per cent of the national output,” Ms Meighan. “IFAD is laser-focused on financing such smallholder farmers to increase productivity and build resilient rural communities.” 

She stressed that IFAD’s mission is to invest in small-scale farmers and producers to build local food security and support vibrant rural communities.

Ms Meighan identified the involvement of the private sector as critical for the successful implementation of SAPZ using the four P model, which entails a public-private producer partnership.

Ms Meighan, who described the private sector as a key growth engine for rural economies, encouraged them to take full advantage of the SAPZ platform.

“IFAD has (a) decades-long successful track record of using the four P model to bring significant benefits to all involved. Olam Nigeria built a new mill in 2014 to process rice but had major challenges finding farmers to bring their rice for processing,” she further noted. “After working successfully with four P model since 2016 in the IFAD-supported VCDP project, Olam has increased its milling capacity by 10 times.”

Agriculture minister Mohammad Abubakar said SAPZ was a government-enabled but private sector-led programme established for inclusive growth and development.

“Our strategic partnership with the state governments, relevant Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) and the private sector will be strengthened through (the) enablement of agro-industrialisation policy facilitation of right mix of incentives for agribusiness ecosystem around SAPZ,’’ he said.

(NAN)