By Chinyere Anyanwu
Ethanol, a major byproduct of cassava, is in great demand in Nigeria’s pharmaceutical, chemical, paints and coatings, cosmetics, and alcoholic and beverage industries. With national demand of over 5 billion litres per annum and current domestic production of about 134 million litres, according to research reports from ScienceDirect, the country is left with the burden of importing the shortfall of about 4.8 billion litres of ethanol annually, estimated to cost about N160 billion.
This huge import bill, however, can be eliminated and the money deployed for other infrastructural development, if the country’s cassava value chain, one of the largest in the world, is fully developed and tapped into, as cassava is a major source of ethanol in Nigeria.
This has been of serious concern to stakeholders in the agriculture sector, including the National President of Agricultural Commodity Consumer Association, Dr. Kenechukwu Aloefuna, a major player in the sector, who posits that tackling the high ethanol import bill as well as numerous other agriculture related issues is feasible if government would pay adequate attention to what he termed agricultural money economy.
Aloefuna described agricultural money economy as a foreign exchange earner, and driver of industrialisation and economic growth. He explained that agricultural money economy entails developing all the value chains to the extent that the country can depend on the sector for economic sustenance.
Buttressing his arguement on the need for a well developed agricultural money economy, Aloefuna said, “value chain development is the biggest thing in agriculture. Industrialisation should be driven by agricultural value chain. That’s the big issue here. That we are not having factories operating in Nigeria is because we have not taken agricultural money economy to its proper position. In fact, 80 per cent of our agricultural export is more or less raw material. We are not exporting finished products, which is where the money is. But most times we do primary production; that is, we farm and it’s either we eat it up or allow it to go to waste.”
He lamented that, “Nigeria spends billions of naira annually on the importation of ethanol but this is a product we can get from cassava in large quantity. Nigeria is the highest producer of cassava but Indonesia makes more money from cassava than Nigeria is making from oil and gas because about 90 different products are derived from cassava. But what do we produce out of cassava as the highest producer? We just make fufu and eat. We are not even making money from the export of cassava pallets. Then how much of cassava flour are we making for the confectionary and baking industry? How much of the cassava starch, which is also used industrially, are we producing?
“The money economy would have been to process cassava to the extent that cassava will be notching our earning from crude oil just as Indonesia is making more money from cassava than Nigeria is making from crude oil.”
Expatiating the extent of deprivation Nigeria is suffering for not doing the needful in developing its agricultural money economy, Dr. Aloefuna explained that the livestock value chain, specifically the snail value chain, which should have been generating huge foreign exchange for the country has been immensely neglected.
He noted that, “France is the highest country in the world in the snail value chain. It’s not like they have the largest of snail farming but they have machines for the value chain. What they need is the snail slime. That slime is a billion dollar industry. 1kg of dry slime sells for $60,000.
“When you talk about the agricultural money economy, you look at how the entire South East of the country has this snail yet no governor in that region has any intent or desire to develop it. There is no single state that has supported snail farmers to do anything in the snail industry but that is an economy that is sustaining a country. Snail slime is very important in the pharmaceutical and cosmetics industries. So it’s no longer about rearing and eating snails but what do you get out of it?”
Emphasising the critical role of agricultural money economy to industrialisation, the national president of Agricultural Commodity Consumer Association and rice expert stressed that Nigeria is still dilly dallying when it comes to operating in the agricultural ecosystem.
He argued that despite the demand of the Maputo Declaration, which Nigeria is a signatory to, that assigned 10 per cent of a country’s total budget to agriculture annually, the country is still falling short of that requirement. He added that though the 10 per cent may not be enough, Nigeria’s budget is still below the assigned figure, which, according to him, “tells you there is no commitment and somebody who should be committed is somebody who understands agricultural money economy.”
Stating that Nigeria is yet to take advantage of its enormous potential in agricultural money economy, Aloefuna said, “Nigeria imports almost 90 per cent of the juice we drink so how come our oranges and mangoes are wasting. We can actually eat mango round the year. You can dry the mango, that is, dehydrating it. There are machines that can extract the water from it and it will still retain its original fresh taste.
“You can find this all over Asia. They don’t even have the trees but they buy the mango and process it so they can eat it round the year. The same mango gives you ingredients for industrial production of beverage.
Then how many factories do you have in Benue that is one of the biggest producers of fruits like mango, orange and other vegetables? Mambilla Plateau is where you can plant fresh apple because of its climatic condition but how many farms does it have? The truth is that we have not even started when it comes to agricultural ecosystem.”
Dr. Aloefuna stressed the need for innovators who will focus on developing agriculture to play its role in the economy to take over the saddle of leadership of the country. According to him, “until you have innovators in government, things will not take their proper shape.”