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By Chinyere Anyanwu [email protected]
In 2023, ginger farmers in Kachia Local Government Area and other parts of Kaduna lost an estimated N12 billion to a fungal disease epidemic that destroyed their ginger crops.
In response to the disaster, President Bola Tinubu established a N1.6 billion Ginger Recovery Advancement and Transformation for Economic Empowerment (GRATE) fund to enable the farmers participate in the new planting season.
The state government also announced a scheme to support the farmers through the Kaduna State Agricultural Development Agency (KADA). Both intervention programmes provided farm inputs such as fertilisers, agrochemicals, crop protection products and maize and sorghum seeds to the farmers.
Announcing the federal intervention fund last March, the Executive Director of the National Agricultural Development Fund (NADF), Mohammed Ibrahim, said it would be accessible to farmers in seven local government areas, namely Kachia, Jaba, Kagarko, Zangon-Kataf, Kaura, Jema’a and Sanga in southern Kaduna.
Recent investigations, however, reveal that a significant number of farmers were left without the crucial support they desperately needed. The most essential of these was ginger seed, the cost of which skyrocketed to approximately N210,000 per bag last year.
Lamenting the non inclusion of most of the affected ginger farmers in the Federal Government intervention programme, 42 years old ginger farmer, Innocent Isaac, who resides in Gumel in Kachia Local Government Area, said, “life has been harsh since the 2023 epidemic but my pains increased seeing some farmers accessing the government intervention funds while others like me got nothing.”
Isaac’s statement is a confirmation that some farmers in the area benefitted from the government intervention while many others did not, raising concerns about the mode of distribution.
Many farmers in Kachia, Jaba and Zango Kataf local government areas said they did not benefit. Some have since turned to other trades to make ends meet amidst the country’s soaring cost of living crisis.
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Relieved that the Federal Government had launched a support fund for ginger farmers, Alice Abel was full of expectation but her hope of resuming her ginger farming was dashed when the fund eluded her.
She said, “we waited and waited and saw nothing. Now, my labourers are jobless and hunger is biting us.”
Patience Luka, a smallholder farmer in Zango Kataf LGA, said she lost all her ginger crops to the disease infestation, stating that, “the government used middlemen to distribute the fund, so it did not reach anyone here.”
The village head of Hurgyan in Zango Kataf, John Ayuba, said 471 farmers registered for the fund in his community but none received government support.
“Life is difficult here and the government does not care about us. Ginger seed is now gold in the market,” he lamented.
Clarifying the issue of uneven distribution of the Federal Government intervention fund, the Kaduna State government said that government could not help every farmer due to limited resources. It, however, said the state government also had a separate fund and encouraged farmers to switch crops.
The state Director of Agriculture, Bege Bungwon, said many farmers benefited from the state government support programme which kicked off in September 2023, even before the Federal Government intervention fund came in March 2024.
He said, “the NADF support for the affected communities was used to procure palliatives and farm inputs like agro-chemical products, fertilisers and seeds of other crops that we advised the farmers to be planting since they cannot get ginger again.
“I’m not surprised every farmer did not get this intervention. No one should be taken aback if something of such nature does not reach all and sundry because the list used to do such distribution did not even capture everyone.”
