TOMATO farmers under the aegis of Tomatoes and Orchard Producers Association of Nigeria (TOPAN), have called on government at all levels, federal, state and local government, to pay more attention to tomato sector in the country.
National President of the association, Bola Oyeleke, who made the call on behalf of other members recently, stated that the government has done enough in agriculture but when it comes to tomato, the government needs to pay more attention.
He said that tomato is one of the lucrative businesses in the world especially in Nigeria where 98 percent of Nigerians consume tomato.
“That is why the government need to shift their attention to tomato and not just rice alone.
“This year, there is timely rainfall and during the beginning of the year, the heat was very high and immediately the rain started failing the tomato production for the rainy season has already started and you will find out that the amount of rain that fell that time damaged the plant.
“You also find out that during rainy season there are lots of diseases that come up, that is why government intervention is very necessary,” he said.
Oyeleke further stated that planting tomato during the rainy season is highly expensive.
“You have to deal with the disease, you have to deal with so many issues, so you find out that some of the farmers that produce tomato do not have capital for huge production during this time.
“That is why you find out that these diseases creep into the small farms damaging the soil and the plants around the tomato.
“That is why we are calling on the government to refocus and ensure that tomato sector in Nigeria is given attention and also see how they can support the farmers to increase their productivity”.
Oyeleke said that the problem is that small scale farmers do not have enough income to do land preparation.
He said what causes most of these diseases is that most farmers’ land preparation is very poor.
“Our land preparation is very poor in Nigeria, our small scale farmers are not using mechanisation for land preparation and the time they use to prepare land is too short to kill some of these diseases”.
Explaining further, he said: “land preparation is a community issue because community has to come together to do land preparation at the same time. If it is done at the same time, you will find out that most of these pests will find nowhere to hide because what always causes the problem is that if ‘A’ prepares his land and ‘B’ doesn’t these diseases will fly down to the land that is not well prepared.
“So when ‘B’ is preparing his land ‘A’ crop has started growing, by that time the diseases will leave ‘B’ farm and will now shift its attention to ‘A’ farm and destroy his production, so we are looking for a situation where all the small scale farmers within the community will do their land preparation at the same time,” he said.
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