The Federal Government disclosed that Nigeria’s Cassava production of 10 metric tonnes per hectare is small despite the fact that Nigeria is the largest cassava producer in the world and that Nigeria has the potential to hit 40MT per Hectare.
This was disclosed by Mrs Karima Babangida, a Director at the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (FMARD) at the National Root Crop Research Institute (NRCRI) on Thursday.
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“Nigeria is the world’s leading producer of Cassava, in spite of its low yield of 10mt/ha, compared to other countries such as Thailand.
“However, the country has the potential of having good varieties that could give more than 40mt/ha,” she said.
She added that improved production per hectare can be made possible through the dissemination and adoption of improved technologies and innovation by smallholder farmers.
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What you should know
- Recall Affiong Williams, the founder of the food processing company, ReelFruits, told Nairametrics Nigeria’s over-reliance on smallholder farming might be the biggest hindrance by the government to improving Nigeria’s yields per hectare.
- “To improve the output of any crop, one needs to do a lot of testing and control for so many factors to be able to arrive at the right conditions, which increase productivity. Smallholder farmers do not have the resources to do this type of ‘A/B testing’ as it were, and so it is very difficult to get true information and disseminate the right techniques that all of these farmers can apply. I think the government needs to enable more commercial farming by the private sector who are able to acquire the resources to increase productivity and disseminate such learnings at a faster pace.” Williams said.
