FUTA don canvasses establishment of specialized rice institute

A professor of Agricultural Engineering at the Federal University of Technology, Akure, Christopher Akinbile, has called for the creation of a specialized rice institute as a strategy to boost rice production and ultimately ban its importation in Nigeria.

Akinbile made the recommendation while delivering the 135th inaugural lecture of the university entitled: ‘The Wealth of Waste: From Water to Rice’ at the university auditorium.

The don said to significantly turn Nigeria into a major rice producer; government should create a specialized rice institute that will handle all research relating to rice, from breeding through processing and post-harvest operations.

Such an institute, he said, will provide the necessary information and other technical support to rice farmers and others in the chain in order to boost rice production.

After measures to shore up rice production have been institutionalized, Akinbile said the government should step up a robust awareness campaign to sensitise the public on the need to patronize and eat locally produced rice.

He also suggested the formulation and implementation of a policy to forbid rice importation, saying that smuggling of rice would then be criminalized to encourage local production and patronage of made-in-Nigeria rice.

Akinbile noted that rice consumed in Nigeria before 1960 was produced locally, but local production fell from 99 per cent to 38 per cent between 1960 and 1980 due to the non-encouragement of rice farmers.

Professor Akinbile noted that before the recent ban on rice importation in 2019, a Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) report on food import showed that Nigeria spent N365 billion on importation of rice annually, meaning Nigerians consumed N1 billion worth of rice daily.

If Nigeria wants to boost rice production and progressively reduce importation of the commodity, he said, it should take a cue from African Rice Centre formerly West African Rice Development Association (WARDA), International Rice Association Research Institute (IRRI) and the Philippines Rice Research Institute (PRRI) which hinged their domination of rice production on specialized rice institutes.

He also suggested that the government should introduce an agricultural insurance scheme to protect farmers’ investment in rice production in the unlikely event of colossal losses of farmlands and produce to climate change and herders’ invasion.

The don said annual demand for rice in sub-Sahara Africa with particular reference to Nigeria is increasing by six per cent per year, which is fueled by an increase in population growth.

He noted that the world’s population is projected to reach 10 billion by 2050 and that based on this projection, there is a great need to increase rice production to meet the food needs of the growing population.

Professor Akinbile said Nigeria can also leverage her vast wastewater to increase rice production, noting that most human activities that use water end up producing wastewater, which can be recycled for the production of food grains like rice.

Akinbile advised that government at all levels should put in place infrastructure to treat and reuse wastewater as a viable alternative to the scarce freshwater supplies, which will lead to benefiting from the land border closure aimed at preventing rice smuggling into Nigeria.

Speaking in his capacity as the chairman of the occasion, the vice-chancellor, Professor Joseph Fuwape, described the lecturer as a vibrant, intelligent and diversified scholar who has immensely contributed to the growth and development of research and the body of knowledge in his area of core competence and remains a versatile and productive academic.

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FUTA don canvasses establishment of specialized rice institute

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