By Adelola Amihere
With Covid-19 pandemic threatening to disrupt this year’s farming season, the Director General of the National Agricultural Seed Council, (NASC), Dr Philip Ojo has disclosed that 81, 000 metric tonnes of certified seeds are ready for deployment through its accredited seed companies and purchase by farmers in preparation for the 2020 planting season in other to avert a food shortage crisis.
Dr Ojo while addressing journalists via a webinar press conference on Wednesday reiterated that the Seed Council is doing all within its reach to ensure that seed sector related activities are sustained and promoted even in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic for Nigeria to be able to have continuous supply of adequate quantities of food for its population.
He said: “Today as I speak with you, the industry have available at the disposal of accredited seed companies across the country about 81,000 metric tons of certified seeds of rice, maize, sorghum, soya bean, cowpea, millet, groundnut, wheat, sesame and potato that are ready
“As the industry is preparing to push this quantity of certified seeds to the market, companies, like every farmer, are also preparing to go to their fields to plant so that we can have adequate quantities of seeds for the next cropping season.”
While commending the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development for its efforts in ensuring the free movement of food and agricultural inputs across the country, he however noted that bottlenecks were still experienced in that regard.
“Among many operations and services, the COVID-19 government measures on mobility has negatively impacted on the movement of seed companies and farmers to point of sales/agro-dealers, to informal markets, also negatively impacted is the production and supply of early generation seed and more importantly the quality assurance activities including seed field inspection and Laboratory testing”.
He revealed that the Seed Council will be working with various stakeholders to implement various coping actions which will help the sector to continue to function even in the midst of the crisis.
Speaking further, Dr Ojo noted that the effects of the COVID-19 has brought to the fore the importance of agriculture to the nations sustainability as well as the huge responsibility placed on the farmers across the globe, adding that “the urgent need to replace depleted food stock as a result of the massive purchase and consumption is now starring us all in the face and we can only achieve this using high quality seeds”.
