Hibiscus: National Agriculture Quarantine Service Meeting In Kano Timely – Former DG Chambers of Commerce
By ABDULLAHI RABIU, Kano
FORMER Director General Kano/ Jigawa state Chambers of Commerce Alhaji Abdulkareem Abdullah Hussain has said that the recent stakeholders Meeting on hibiscus flower (Zobo) organized by the Nigeria Agricultural Quarantine Service (NAQS) in Kano early this year, was timely for the season and equally motivating for involving many categories of interest groups.
According to the former DG, he was among the few privileged individuals that has the opportunity of attending the meeting as part of AFAN Jigawa State team and, better still, as a former Director General of Kano and Jigawa Chambers of Commerce at different times, as well as someone with a fair knowledge of agro-based producers, processors and Marketers.
He said the during the Meeting, the issue of adulteration of Zobo from the farm to market levels was seriously discussed among visible threats to exporting Zobo from the country.
According to him members have emphasized the need for sensitizing farmers, suppliers and processors who add value, so that they can imbibed good agronomic and trading practices as well as moral re orientation before the Exporters come in.
He seized the opportunity to briefly introduce and talk about Export Expansion Grant [EEG] and advised the meeting to evolve something similar for the local producers.
” I argued that much as the EEG is a good policy strategy to encourage exporters, the producers equally deserves tremendous support to dissuade them from those identified lapses because they are expected to turnout high quality and quantity produce for the exporters.
The former DG said the envisaged support may be in the form of training, provision of quality assurance equipment, favorable market infrastructure, supply of quality seed input.
He said the meeting held purposely to discuss the value of Hibiscus prompted him to plead through this medium, with the professionals, law and policy makers, analysts and relevant stakeholders to come up with a review that will influence government to transform the nation’s agricultural undertakings.
Hassan Abubukar posited that it is becoming necessary to look at the apparent lopsided policies in finance, funding, research, competing demands for quality foods dictated by population and dietary habits.
The elderly among us will recall with nostalgia, the disappearance of people shuttling for livelihoods, to and from farms, markets and agro-based factories, that included women, youngsters and able-bodied men.”
He said presently, those agro-based sources of livelihoods are largely ineffective or gone, so we are left with a new and larger set of idle, uninspired, frustrated youths across the gender engaging in drug abuse and nefarious crimes, albeit not their entire fault.
These and more, left us with no better option than to seriously consider the glaring need to dichotomize the existing Ministry of Agriculture; because the existing scenario is failing to feed us and to sustain our sources of livelihoods for decades. In my humble view, we should have two ministries [one for crops, plants and trees; the other for livestock, poultry and fisheries] subject to critical appraisal.
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