Nigerians in the past few months, consumers have continued to suffer to purchase agro-commodities since about two months ago and there is no sign of any remedy in sight yet.
Although tomato is the major and highly expensive commodities in the market presently, others such as groundnut oil, rice, garri, cassava flour and others.
For instance, a basket of tomatoes that normally sold for N3,500 before is now sold at the rate of N32,000, also a basket of pepper which is now sold at the rate of N17,000 was initially sold at the beginning of this about N6,000. What could be responsible for this?
To some Hausa pepper sellers in the major markets in Lagos and consumers, the situation might be due to dearth of rain. However, the farmers declared that the scarcity was due to a disease affecting the products in their various farms, which has been going out of their control.
They maintained that it was the direct consequence of the destructive activities of a pest known as the ‘tomato leaf miner’, saying the operations of this moth was responsible for the drastic reduction and, in some cases, extirpating of tomato supplies from the north.
According to National Mirror tomato farmers within the last month have recorded a minimum of 40 per crop loss to the menace.
However, a farmer and wholesale, Alhaji O. Aminu, noted that the effects of climate change have also weighed against the crop. According to him, there was a widespread stunting of tomatoes due to the excessive heat recorded this year.
Another farmer Mallam Abdullahi Umaru said all his effort to prevent the outbreak in his farm came to no avail.
Mallam Inusa, another local farmer in the North, lamented the losses suffered in production with complete wipe out in some farms, pointing to the bare nature of assistance received from the government so far.
Meanwhile, the Managing Director of AgroNigeria, Richard-Mark Mbaram, said he considered the action of the government on this issue to be downright unacceptable. He said that the nature of the response, by states such as Kano and Kaduna, which saw the government going into exploratory talks with chemical producing companies, should have attained national prominence by now
Although tomato is the major and highly expensive commodities in the market presently, others such as groundnut oil, rice, garri, cassava flour and others.
For instance, a basket of tomatoes that normally sold for N3,500 before is now sold at the rate of N32,000, also a basket of pepper which is now sold at the rate of N17,000 was initially sold at the beginning of this about N6,000. What could be responsible for this?
To some Hausa pepper sellers in the major markets in Lagos and consumers, the situation might be due to dearth of rain. However, the farmers declared that the scarcity was due to a disease affecting the products in their various farms, which has been going out of their control.
They maintained that it was the direct consequence of the destructive activities of a pest known as the ‘tomato leaf miner’, saying the operations of this moth was responsible for the drastic reduction and, in some cases, extirpating of tomato supplies from the north.
According to National Mirror tomato farmers within the last month have recorded a minimum of 40 per crop loss to the menace.
However, a farmer and wholesale, Alhaji O. Aminu, noted that the effects of climate change have also weighed against the crop. According to him, there was a widespread stunting of tomatoes due to the excessive heat recorded this year.
Another farmer Mallam Abdullahi Umaru said all his effort to prevent the outbreak in his farm came to no avail.
Mallam Inusa, another local farmer in the North, lamented the losses suffered in production with complete wipe out in some farms, pointing to the bare nature of assistance received from the government so far.
Meanwhile, the Managing Director of AgroNigeria, Richard-Mark Mbaram, said he considered the action of the government on this issue to be downright unacceptable. He said that the nature of the response, by states such as Kano and Kaduna, which saw the government going into exploratory talks with chemical producing companies, should have attained national prominence by now