Nigeria trails Uganda, Ghana in agricultural research funding

Despite its large size of agriculture in relation to other African nations, Nigeria lags behind its peers in the sector in terms of research funding directed at increased agricultural productivity.

For every $100 of agricultural output, Nigeria invests only $0.42 into agricultural research, as compared to $0.94 and $1.40 in Ghana and Uganda respectively, says a report by ActionAid, a global non-profit organisation of people with a commitment to furthering human rights and defeating poverty for all.    

The budget of Ghana just for major science and technology agencies, for instance, soared from US$5 million in 2007 to US$39 million in 2008, says the International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI).

Ghana however has a smaller sized population and agricultural industry and by 2008, it had the equivalent of 537 full time researchers working in agriculture.

Nigeria has the highest agricultural research system in Africa though, in terms of investments and number of researchers, with over 80 government and high education institutes and over 2,000 researchers engaged in research. However, budget implementation is often low and official fraud limits funds from reaching their points of critical need.

Annual government documents show that the Federal Government spent just 2 percent of its agriculture budget on research from 2007 to 2011, while the 36 state governments spent less than 1.5 percent on agricultural research.

Yet, investing in agricultural research and development is vital for imparting knowledge to farmers, developing improved crop varieties and techniques to increase yield, and managing water and other natural resources more sustainably.

Nigeria is said to have produced over 200 agricultural technologies since 1997, yet the participation of farmers in these processes has been low.

A document prepared by ActionAid and spotted by BusinessDay says that 25 percent of researchers in Nigeria have no interaction with farmers and 51 percent have no interaction with extension workers.

YANGE IKYAA