TheNewsGuru

Tag: rice

  • Rice will remain expensive for the foreseeable future – Yemi Osinbajo

    The deputy president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, Yemi Osinbajo has revealed that rice, the staple food of most Nigerians will remain expensive for the foreseeable future.

    Osinbajo made this revelation when a Nigerian citizen challenged him on the soaring price of the staple food in the country while he was on an unscheduled visit to Mpape mechanic village in Abuja yesterday.

    The prices of staple foods and everyday consumables have continued to soar high recent times in Nigeria, and in the midst of dwindling price of crude oil and the ever increasing exchange rate. With so many factors working together, the Nigerian economy has pronged into recession.

    Although, government representatives have envisioned that Nigeria would be lifted off recession in the New Year 2017, economic analysts have said there is no light in the horizon yet.

    Deputy President Yemi Osinbajo has probably buttressed the stand of the analysts and he has said the price of rice will continue to remain the way it is until the country reaches self-sufficiency with rice production.

    At the unscheduled visit of the deputy president to the Mpape area of Abuja, the Nigerian whose name could not be confirmed as at the time of filing this report, queried the deputy president saying, “With the way things are going, we are suffering. We don’t really know. We thought that as you people are coming in, we are going to rejoice. But now, we are suffering”.

    “How can we buy a bag of rice for 19,000 or 18,000 naiar?” the young man who might be in his late twenties queried.

    “We cannot afford that; and there is no work we do here. So, the thing is paining us,” he added.

    In response, the deputy to President Muhammadu Buhari flanked by the Nigerian Minister of Information, Lai Muhammed, said, “Let me tell you first about this rice. You see, the thing about government is that, government is a people, flesh and blood like you and I that run the government and we must run it with sense”.

    “Look at this rice; in Kebbi, Jigawa, Kano; all those places, there are farmers. Many of them or none never had any work because all the rice was imported from China, Thailand, India, everywhere.

    “Many of the rice are old, nine years, ten years, but they bring them here, and they are cheap because they are all imported, but our farmers have not work.

    “Now, we said, we must provide work for Nigerians; Nigerians must farm. They must mill the rice, distribute the rice, locally. That is what we are trying to do now; so, hundreds of thousands of farmers in all the places where they are farming rice, millet, sorghum in Nigeria, they are producing rice now,” the deputy president added.

    Osinbajo at this point has to plead with the visibly irritated young man and the crowd he was addressing to calm down for him to conclude his rice speech.

    He continued that although the country is not producing enough rice yet, he stressed the price of rice will remain quite expensive at the interim because that is the only way the nation can make progress.

    “It will be expensive first, it cannot be cheap immediately. It will first be expensive. When it is expensive, there will be some suffering, but that is the only way by which we can make progress.

    “We can’t make progress any other way,” the deputy president concluded.

  • Test reveals no evidence of plastic rice in Nigeria

    The Minister of Health, Prof. Isaac Adewole, Thursday, cleared the air over the rumour of dreaded plastic rice confiscated by the Federal Operations Unit (FOU) of the Nigeria Customs Service, (NCS).

    Adewole explained on his official Twitter account that there is no evidence backing claims that the seized bags contains rice plastic rice in Lagos.

    Recall that the Customs Area Comptroller (CAC), Federal Operations Unit, Zone ‘A’, Ikeja; Comptroller Haruna Mamudu said the unit seized no fewer than 102 bags of the plastic rice at a warehouse in Ikeja, Lagos.

    Mamudu said, bags of plastic which has been packaged for sale during the yuletide were to be evacuated before operatives of the swooped on the managers of the warehouse.

    According to Mamudu, the imported rice, which was branded as ‘best tomato’, had no manufacture, expiry date and NAFDAC registration number. In a tweet via his Twitter handle, the Minister said.

  • LASG to roll out “Lake Rice’’ at N13,000 on Dec. 15

    LASG to roll out “Lake Rice’’ at N13,000 on Dec. 15

    The Lagos State Government on Thursday said it was ready to roll out Lake Rice on Dec. 15 to Lagosians at N13,000 per 50 kg towards the Yuletide celebrations.

    Mr Sanni Okanlawan, Special Adviser on Food Security to Gov. Akinwumi Ambode, made the disclosure in Lagos during the Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI) National Agriculture Stakeholders Summit.

    Okanlawan said that sales of the rice would be made at all the 57 Local Government Areas (LGAs) and Local Council Development Areas (LCDAs) in the state to ensure proper distribution.

    “Lake Rice is the acronym of both Lagos and Kebbi States joint product which will be out to the public on Dec. 15 at the rate of N13,000 per 50kg bag as it is already subsidised by the government.

    “To make it more available, the rice will be sold at the 57 LGAs and LCDAs for easy accessibility and to guard against unwanted persons diverting the product.

    “The state government has put in place a committee that will ensure that Lagosians have the best Christmas celebration, that is why we are offering the wholesome and well packaged rice,’’ Okanlawan said.

    The special adviser also said that the state had established a Department of Agribusiness, an Agriculture Trust Fund and Commodity Exchange Market to be set up soon.

    The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the government’s efforts were in alignment with the Federal Government’s diversification drive from a mono-economy to agriculture.

  • FG blocks 571,000 tonnes of rice from entering Nigeria

    FG blocks 571,000 tonnes of rice from entering Nigeria

    The Federal Government said it has perfected plans to stop about 571,000 tonnes of foreign rice kept in neighbouring countries targeted for sales in the yuletide period from entering the Nigerian market.

    The Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Chief Audu Ogbeh, who disclosed this in Abuja on Monday, stated that some of Nigeria’s neighbours, particularly the Republic of Benin, were not moving goods within the region as required by relevant treaties.

    He, however, stated that the Federal Government would henceforth check all illegal movements of food and non-food items into Nigeria from the neighbouring countries.

    Ogbeh also said Nigeria recently took delivery of 110 rice mills in its bid to enhance local production so as to commence the exportation of white rice from next year.

    In Ogbeh’s words:, “What they do is that they import goods, station themselves at our borders and then smuggle them into Nigeria. For instance, the Republic of Benin doesn’t eat parboiled rice. They eat white rice. But all the rice that comes from the borders into Nigeria is parboiled.

    “I have a list now of all the ships that left Thailand in the last seven weeks and they’ve arrived; 571,000 tonnes of rice waiting to enter Nigeria for Christmas. But we won’t allow that. We have to review the treaty in the region, because we are at the losing end. Why are we doing this? It is because this rice is not definitely grown in the Republic of Benin.”

    Speaking further, Ogbeh said: “They bring tomato paste and chicken not produced in the Republic of Benin and because the Nigerian market is so huge, that they want to exploit it. But no economy out of sympathy should damage our own and we should not out of sentiment allow anybody to do things to us, which we can’t do to them.

    “When Dangote was trying to ship his cement through the Republic of Benin to Togo, it took him one year to persuade them.”

    Ogbeh reiterated that the country would start exporting rice from next year, as he stated that 110 mills had been acquired to make this a reality.

    He said, “We can make it happen. We have just brought in 110 rice mills of different capacities. Some can do 100 tonnes, others 50, 40, 20 and 10 tonnes. We are going to give them to cooperative organisations and rice millers all over the country to enhance their milling capacities.

    “We have another 12 rice mills to come in maybe next year so that the milling capacity is strong enough for us and we too will begin to export white rice to West Africa.”

    On the issue of possible famine in Nigeria from January next year, the minister stated that the government was prepared and promised that the country would not experience such.

    The minister stated, “We want to put it quite clearly that there is no danger of famine in the country, because the government will not allow that to happen. We are already taking steps to make sure that Nigerians don’t go through any such harrowing experience. There has been some panic over the massive purchase of grains from many of the big grain producing fields in some parts of the country.

    “This fear was heightened by emirs and chiefs in the North, who met with us on Tuesday last week and raised the same anxiety. It is true that for the first time in our history, we are witnessing an extra-ordinary purchase of our grains from the West, North and Central Africa. We are even getting demands from as far as Namibia; they are asking for grains in large quantities of up to 37,000 tonnes of maize,” Ogbeh said.