Lagos – Mr Tosin Awomovi, an aquaculture farmer and consultant, on Friday urged the Federal Government to ensure that farmers receive the right farm inputs under its Growth Enhancement Support (GES) Scheme.
Awomovi told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Lagos that a situation where almost all farmers received different input from what they applied for was not in the best interest of the programme.
According to him, government must review GES to supply appropriate farm inputs to appropriate farmers; a poultry farmer should be given poultry inputs and equipment and not something else.
“Last year as an aquaculture farmer, I was given two bags of fertiliser, which was meant for crop farmers and that was how our information was mixed up.
“The government must learn to conduct follow up measures after organising programme to avoid a repeat,’’ said the aquaculture farmer.
Awomovi also advised government to attract foreign animal feed producers to establish mills in Nigeria in order to make feed more available to farmers at affordable cost.
“Instead of giving five bags of feed to farmers and some juveniles to aquaculture farmers, they can speak to investors to bring their companies to Nigeria.
“If they bring those companies down to Nigeria, it would reduce cost heavily and in turn be beneficial to the feed mill companies such as Coppens.
“Coppens made a lot of money between 2013 and 2014 and the government can ask them to establish and produce the feed in Nigeria instead of importing and giving it to farmers,’’ he said.
Awomovi also urged the Federal Government to support local fish feed producers such as Vitafeed as way of supporting home-made products to improve production. (NAN)