Ebonyi Commissioner Attributes Crash In Food Prices To Government Investment In Agriculture 

Alex Odeh

The Ebonyi State Commissioner for Agriculture and Natural Resources, Hon. Mrs Nkechinyere Iyioku, has attributed the crash in the price of staple food, especially rice on the huge investment the Ebonyi State government under Francis Nwifuru had made in agriculture.

Mrs. Iyioku disclosed this during an interview with journalists in Abakaliki.

The Commissioner explained that the price of a bushel of rice which last year December stood at #30,000-#40,000 had crashed to #22,000-#25,000, attributing the crash to the huge investment the Ebonyi State government had made in agriculture.

Iyioku, who further disclosed plans by the Ebonyi State government in partner with the Federal Government to rehabilitate dams in the State to facilitate irrigation, noted her government partnership with Thailand to boost rice and livestock production.

She said, “For instance, since we came on board in 2023, I’ve been distributing a lot of agricultural inputs to help our farmers. I’ll keep on telling Eboyians that it’s good to have a second address.

“No matter what you are doing, you have to have something else you are doing. And we have to go back to farm. And since we came in, like I said, most of the things, the agricultural input is yielding a very big result.

“Like if you go to the markets, for instance, now, if you go to rice meal, maybe after this interview, you can even visit the rice mill. The cost of rice is now very cheap compared to what it used to be before.

“During December period, they sold for #35,000, #40,000, but now it’s #22,000. Maximum is #25,000. But you can still see good species, very good species. You can buy for #22,000, #23,000 in the market.

“So it’s really yielding a very big result because many people have now gone back to farm, many people are into farming, and the price of food is coming down.

“But we have not gotten there, we cannot boast that based on the price of the food now, that everything is okay, but we will still get there. We are still working very hard to make sure that the price of food would be the way it used to be then, not what is happening now.

“So we are working very hard to make sure that the price of food comes down. At least they will start selling like #10,000, #12,000 as they used to sell years back. But apart from that, even if you go to the North, the price of food in the state compared to other states, especially our neighboring states, is even better here.

“I stand to be corrected. It’s still better here in Abakaliki. And like I said, when we finish, people can go to the market and do their own market survey. So the price of food here in Abakaliki is better than what they are selling in our neighboring states.

“The cost of food is coming down. So that is just a good example. Yes, I said it. I said what you do to farmers is to give them inputs. And we normally give them free of charge.

“We don’t collect anything. We are working very hard to make sure that Ebonyi state is the food basket of the nation. Not only in Southeast, the whole country. So we are trying a situation that our people will know some of the techniques and skills. So we invited people from Thailand.

“You know Thailand, they are very good in rice production. They are very, very good. And they are good, too, in livestock like fish. So we invited them. We partnered with them. And they came. And we invited a lot of farmers. They came here. We had one day training.

“And they taught us a lot of things about livestock and rice production. And apart from that, we want a situation we partner with them that will be farming thrice a year. Not only in wet season.

“Because one of the challenges we are having is that we only farm once every day. Though we are working with the federal government to make sure that most of our dams, because it’s an irrigation problem, immediately they develop our dam.

“We’ll start farming all the time. And if we start farming like twice or thrice, honestly, we’ll be exporting our rice. Because we are good in agriculture”, she boasted.