The Federal Government says it will reopen the
existing grazing reserves to address farmers-herdsmen clashes across the
country.
Audu Ogbeh, Minister of
Agriculture and Rural Development, said this on Monday while speaking to
newsmen on the achievements of President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration in
the agriculture sector in three years.
Ogbeh said although some of the
415 gazetted grazing reserves in the country had been encroached on, there was
still about three million hectares of land available for cattle grazing
reserves.
“We have to get it sorted out and
we are starting work in another week or two to reopen the old grazing reserves.
“At a time at the end of the
first republic, there were 415 of them even as far down as the South West and
South East.
“Today, they have been encroached
upon (but) we still have three million hectares available for cattle grazing
reserves, that is more than the cattle in Nigeria needs.
“The problem is that over the
years, we forgot that these herdsmen were going to become a problem.
”Later in life and especially,
this new attitude by herdsmen that when they enter your farm, they should be
free to eat your crops and you have no right to challenge them.
“That is a new phenomenon which
we find extremely disturbing that when they do so, if you complain they can
shoot you.
“That was not so many years ago
which is why we simply have to deal with the matter now.
“But the final message to
Nigerians is that we have no choice but to produce enough food to feed
ourselves so that the average family does not spend more than 20 per cent of
its earnings buying food.
”As it is, it almost 60 per cent
that people spend buying food. It is too expensive and its not sustainable,” he
said.
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