The Federal Government said it has commenced domestication of the Malabo Declaration, which stipulates that 10 per cent of Nigeria’s budget be appropriated to the agricultural sector.
The Federal Government said it has commenced domestication of the Malabo Declaration, which stipulates that 10 per cent of Nigeria’s budget be appropriated to the agricultural sector.
An official of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, Baye Sylvester who disclosed this at a 3-day meeting organised by African Union (AU) and New Partnership for Africa Development (NEPAD), on ‘Expert Panel to Draft New Plan for Achieving Economic Diversity through Major Investments in Agriculture,’ in Abuja, said the implementation has begun through the Green Alternative road map.
Sylvester said government has been committed to the process of domesticating the declaration, which has been on transparency in policy formulation and implementation in line with the three cardinal principles of transparency, accountability and peer reviewing of Comprehensive Africa Agriculture Development Programme (CAADP), and National Agriculture Investment Plan (NAIP).
The key purpose of the meeting was on review of the plan for making crop, livestock and fisheries the centrepiece of Nigeria’s economic development agenda. The effort also will ensure NAIP aligns with commitments contained in the AU’s 2014 ‘Malabo Declaration’, which seeks to cut poverty rates to half by 2025 through agriculture-led economic growth.
He said: “In the African region, as far as Agriculture is concerned Nigeria has recorded quite a lot of progress. The ‘Malabo Declaration’ is just been domesticated and there is no country that can say they have been able to do that. This is because Malabo commitment is coming up through the second generation of the NAIP. Every country has started the process and also Nigeria has started it.”
In his remarks, Senior Advisor and CAADP Team Leader, African Union Commission, Ernest Ruzindaza, and Augustin Wambo Yamdjeu, Head of CAADP, NEPAD Planning and Coordination Agency, said the AU and NEPAD were out to see how African countries could put in more resources into agriculture and also create wealth and employment for their youth and women.