Nigeria spends about $10 billion annually on food imports despite vast agricultural potential, the Minister of Agriculture and Foodb Security, Abubakar Kyari, has said.
Kyari disclosed this yesterday at the ‘First Bank of Nigeria Ltd. 2025 Agric and Export Expo’, which was held in Lagos..
Represented by his Special Adviser, Ibrahim Alƙali, the minister described the rising food import bill as unsustainable and stressed the need for increased financing to boost local production and exports.
“Nigeria spends over $10 billion annually importing food such as wheat, rice, sugar, fish, and even tomato paste. Agriculture already contributes 35 percent of our Gross Domestic Product (GDO), and employs 35 percent of our workforce. We sit on 85 million hectares of arable land with a youth population of over 70% under the age of 30. Yet Nigeria accounts for less than 0.5% of global agro-exports.
“Currently, the nation earns less than $400 million from agro exports. To build a non-oil export economy, we must rethink how we finance agriculture”, Kyari said.
He reiterated President Bola Tinubu’s commitment to achieving food sovereignty, warning that Nigeria must reduce its dependence on foreign food supplies.
“President Tinubu has made it clear that food sovereignty is the goal. Nigeria must not only feed itself but do so on its own terms, free from excessive dependency on imports.
“We have the land, the labour, and the markets. What we lack is the system of financing, value addition, and infrastructure that can turn potential into prosperity.
“The fundamentals compel us to pivot from dependence on oil rigs to resilience in food and export earnings; from raw commodity exports to value-added agri-business; from fragmented farmer credit to structured financial systems that attract significant capital; and from stereotypes to active youth participation in agriculture”, he said.
Kyari also called for innovative mechanisms to strengthen food security.
