Policy disconnect hampers Nigeria’s agric growth

The agricultural sector in Africa’s most populous nation is experiencing minimal growth due to a gap in government policies and the actual reality of farmers and agribusinesses, experts have said.

At a recent convening of agric stakeholders and policy at the Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI) 2026 Agribusiness Outlook, the experts said there is a lacuna between agricultural policies implementation of the federal government and the living reality of players in the sector.

Muda Yusuf, chief executive officer of the Centre for Promotion of Private Enterprises (CPPE), cited the import waiver policy as an example of how policies often contrast with the realities of agribusiness stakeholders.

Yusuf warned agribusinesses not to strategise on policy announcements without first researching the implementation timeline, impacts and process.

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“There is a huge gap between policy pronouncements by the federal government and the reality on the ground,” he told agric stakeholders. “The agricultural sector is one of the most challenging sectors in the economy. Data shows that the sector is struggling.”

In 2025, farmers suffered financial and post-harvest losses due to the import waiver policy, which allowed the entry of commodities such as rice and maize at little to no duty. However, experts say the policy was implemented without a proper understanding of Nigerian farmers.

According to Yusuf, the negative impact of the import waiver policy “was so much that the effect is still lingering today. While citizens were happy that food prices were crashing, agric investors were lamenting losses.”

However, if Nigeria’s food system will grow, Ade Adefeko, director of Corporate Regulatory Affairs at Olam Agri, an agribusiness firm, said the country needs to integrate more smallholder farmers into its food sovereignty vision through strategic policies that are shifted towards aggressive agric growth.

Despite being the largest producers of yams and cassava, Nigeria struggles with a farm to market access. Adefeko said the country’s poor reserves and storage infrastructures are leading to food waste.

“We must move from policy to productivity. Enough of too much talk. We must stop viewing agriculture as a social service and start treating it as a hard-coded economic asset,” he said.

As a call to action, he urged for a strategic national storage reserve that has capacity to accommodate local productions and cut Nigeria’s current annual post-harvest loss of N3.5 trillion.

“Let us stop discussing Nigeria’s potential and start walking towards productivity. We have the land, the crops; we only have to act,” Adefeko urged.

The way forward

The experts noted that the agric sector could offer so much more to the economy with public-private partnerships (PPP) and credible policies that meet the needs of agric stakeholders.

Leye Kupoluyi, president of the LCCI, emphasised the importance of agriculture to Africa’s most populous nation’s economy, noting that the sector contributes over a quarter of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) with a real growth of 3.8 percent in 2025.

Despite this, he noted that the sector faces significant challenges like low productivity, insecurity, weak policies, and post-harvest losses.

“The future of Nigeria’s agribusiness lies in building deliberate and productive partnerships between government and private sectors,” said Kupoluyi.

Also, Africanfarmer Mogaji, chief executive officer of X-rays Farms Consulting, called for long-term thinking and PPP collaboration, citing examples like the successful tomato price stabilisation initiative in 2025, a move that halted Tuta Absoluta outbreak in tomato value for the first time in 12 years.

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He said, “Nigeria needs more players in the food value chain to enable food prices to crash.” He pushed for a positive mindset amongst industry players, asking, “Are you trapped in Nigeria’s past or are you obsessed with Nigeria’s future?”