The Senate has urged President Bola Tinubu to urgently address the food insecurity across the nation.
This prayer followed a motion moved by Sunday Karimi (APC, Kogi West) and co-sponsored by Ali Ndume ( APC, Borno South) at the Tuesday plenary.
The motion titled, “Urgent Need to Address Food Insecurity and Market Exploitation of Consumables In Nigeria,” noted that in the last few months, the price of goods and household consumables have been on an abysmal rise in the country, leading to a high rate of inflation, weakened buying power, and general worsening of living conditions of the vast majority of Nigerians.
Karimi further noted that the latest data by the National Bureau of Statistics shows that “food inflation in the country skyrocketed to 40.66 per cent on a year-on-year basis, a significant increase from the 24.82 per cent recorded in May 2023.
“The current market price of food items such as beans, maize, rice paddy, yam, tomatoes, and onions which initially rose by about 40% after the removal of petroleum Subsidy has now increased to over 100% to 300% without any attributable reason for the increase in prices.”
He added, “Although insecurity in food-producing regions, bad roads, increase in the cost of transportation attributable to the removal of fuel subsidy and depreciation of the value of naira, are possible factors that have contributed to the increase in price of food items, household commodities, and consumables; the percentage of increase in cost of transportation and some under factors listed above, is significantly less than the percentage increase in the current prices of goods all ever the country.”
Karimi lamented that “there is a general attitude of ‘Get Rich Quickly’ or ‘Get Rich By All Means’ leading many Nigerians to jettison “being their brother’s keeper” and exploiting one another to make abnormal profits: This attitude has been justified on the basis that many political Class Technocrats, and Corporate Elites and Corporate Elites have helped themselves with Public Funds without any repercussions in law, Nigerian traders have thus resorted to Price Gouging to maximize profits.”
Karimi further stated that there are reports that farming communities in the border regions with other vountries, “prefer to sell their food items abroad (to these neighboring countries), rather than domestically(to the hinterland), thereby increasing local food insecurity.
“All efforts made by the current Federal Executive to arrest the consistent increase in food inflation have not yielded the desired results, there is a need to be more pragmatic about addressing food insecurity, curbing herder farmer crises, kidnapping for ransom, and Terrorism, and ensure the development of a viable National Commodity Board to regulate the price of grains and ensure the elimination of artificial contributions to food and commodity inflation in Nigeria.”
In his contribution, Ndume lamented that this was the first time Nigeria was listed as one of the countries battling food insecurity.
He said, “In their many publications, they say Nigeria is likely to experience the highest session of food insecurity globally.
“Currently, there are four countries including Sudan and some others that are facing very serious insecurity. Nigeria is added to this list this year by the International Rescue Committee as one of the spots for food insecurity action against hunger. World Food Program also indicated that over 32 million people are expected to face a critical hunger crisis and emerging levels between June and August.
“I don’t know about some other colleagues, but there in the North, we have started seeing it visibly. This is the first time we are experiencing this level of hunger. It’s the first time Nigeria is being listed as one of the countries with food insecurity.”
In his comment, the Senate President, GodsWill Akpabio, noted that the food insecurity followed the insecurity that had ravaged the country.
The Senate, thereafter, urged the Federal Government to address the food crises across the country.