The President of All Farmers Association of Nigeria, AFAN, Architect Ibrahim Kabir, Thursday, charged members to take responsibility to produce more food for Nigerians during this period of Coronavirus, COVID-19, outbreak. Kabir stated this in a chat with Vanguard while urging members to maintain a high level of preventive measures against the deadly virus. He said: “Nigeria will, therefore, rely heavily on the farmers for life and livelihood during this trying period so all hands should be on deck to upscale our production.

“The members of AFAN all over should accept the national responsibility to provide food for us all.”  He also called on the government to provide palliatives as an intervention to up-scale food production. “Like every sector, the government is being called upon to provide a special assistance package specifically to boost agricultural production. “This could take the form of special subsidies for inputs further to the reduction, the CBN announced, of the interest rates from nine per cent to five per cent. “AFAN itself does not have direct resources to give to the farmers as you know we are only an advocacy nongovernmental organisation group”, he said. Meanwhile, he (Kabir) urged members to adhere to strict hygiene measures given by the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control, NCDC, as they feed the nation.

“I, therefore, enjoin all to embrace the preventive measures outlined by the NCDC as there is no known cure for the virus. “If there is a full-blown outbreak, God forbid, the Nigerian medical facilities are ill-equipped to contain the scourge so it is safer to prevent the occurrence of the full-blown outbreak in the first instance. “There is a very strong opportunity for the healthy farmer to participate in the production of food for the 200,000,000 mouths requiring food than a COVID-19 ravaged farmer population incapable of going to the farm. “Regular washing of hands, social distancing, wearing face masks, self-isolation, avoiding crowding, and others”, he advised.

SOURCE: VANGUARD