The federal government would on Thursday formally flag-off the export of yam to Europe and other parts of the globe, Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Chief Audu Ogbeh, has said.
Speaking to State House correspondents at the end of the weekly Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting on Wednesday, Ogbeh said 72 tonnes of yams would be exported to the United Kingdom (UK) in the first phase of the exportation programme.
Yam, a tuber crop, is a staple food in Nigeria and is grown in several parts of the country.
He said: “Some people have asked whether by exporting yams we are not going to subject Nigeria to hunger and I had to inform council today that that will not certainly not rise.
“You will remember about February or March this year some of you asked the same question, is Nigeria going to face famine? and I said it cannot happen. Apart from the crisis in the North east we definitely are not short of food although prices are high in some areas, we are not short of food.
“Tomorrow we shall flag off this export in three container loads containing 72tones of Nigerian yams. Two containers went out in February, one arrived in New York on the 16th of this month.
“This is important because for those of you who travel and many Nigerians out there, you go to shops where they sell African foods and you never see anything from Nigeria, it is mostly called Ghana yams.
“Now we account for 61% of the total output of yams in the world according to the Food and Agriculture Organisation, the rest is shared between some countries in the West Africa and the West Indies. For us to go abroad and not find Nigerian yams in the market, it is an embarrassment.”
The minister also expressed concern that pNigerians don’t even consume all the yams they produce because most of it is lost to wastage because of poor technologies in preservation.
He said Ghana is targeting $4billion from yams in the next three years and if they can do that, then Nigerians who are the masters of yam production have no business lagging behind.
“We are going to solar coolers in yam markets and yam producing areas to keep the temperature at 14 degrees Celsius, not frozen but to keep it at that temperature so that it can be good all year round and can last up to two to three years in the containers
“Essentially we are making this point because we are diversifying the economy, we are talking about economic recovery and growth and we will have to export whatever is needed from Nigeria by other countries so we can earn more foreign exchange rather than expend everything we have on importation. If they want yams we will sell yams, if they want pepper we will sell pepper, if they want ginger we will sell ginger,” he said.
