31st March, 2017
The Federal Government says it is collaborating with the International Crop Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT) and other research establishments to guarantee that citizens have access to bio-fortified foods.
Sen. Heineken Lokpobiri, the Minister of state for Agriculture and Rural Development, said this at the Sensitisation Program on Bio-invigorated Crops for Building Nutritious Food Basket (BNFB) project in Abuja on Friday.
Bio-fortification is the process of increasing nutritional value of food crops by increasing the density of vitamins and minerals in a crop through conventional breeding, agronomic practices or biotechnology.
Lokpobiri said the organization which would come full circle into the creation of high nutritious nourishment, was a stage toward lessening hunger among citizens particularly the younger generations.
As indicated by him, Nigeria has the lowest life expectancy and has about 30 per cent of malnourished children because of the kind of food that we consume that is not nutritious.
“The journey toward eradication of malnutrition has commenced and this is a crusade that everyone must be engaged in more so now that there are no more petrol-dollars.
“The ministry has a directive from President Muhammadu Buhari to collaborate with different agencies and NGOs to see how we can improve the nutritional value of our foods.
“Yes, food is available in the country but some of them are not nutritious.
“There is no way Nigeria can compete with other parts of the world if we do not collaborate to make sure that we get only bio-fortified crops.
“Some of our agro-products are rejected because they do not have the required nutrients.
“If we have enough bio-fortified crops, there will be no need for the World Food Programme to be importing food to help our brothers in the North East because they claim that our food is not nutritious,’’ the minister said.
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Mrs Phorbee Olapeju, the Country Director, International Potato Center (CIP) and the facilitator of the program, said it was targeted for sharpening the legislature to bolster the activity by incorporating it in its programme and projects.
She said the BNFB activity was taking a shot at tubers like orange fleshed sweet potato, yellow cassava, iron and zinc invigorated maize and millet.
Olapeju urged the Federal Government to incorporate bio-braced nourishments in its new home-developed school sustaining program, which is presently a national order.
The country director said the bio-invigorated harvests which the centre was promoting were conventionally bred, organic, natural and not genetically modified
As indicated by her, farmers are presently planting the vines, circulating the planting materials and the crops have gone through the release committee before the distribution.
“In the food basket initiative, you will have a crop that is peculiar to every state in the country.
“We want the government to include at least one bio-fortified crop in our school feeding menu programme.
“We want the present administration to buy into this initiative and support the scaling up. We have been encouraging this at the grassroots,’’ she said.
Mr Tukur Abdulazeez, a Research Technician with ICRISAT, said that bio-fortification entailed enriching crops with nutrients by retrogressing genes from plant to plant.
He said the institute in collaboration with the Institute for Agricultural Research, Samaru in Zaria, Kaduna State, had released two new varieties of sorghum in the country which was rich in iron and zinc for pregnant women and children.
The research technician listed some crops that are currently bio-fortified in the country to include some varieties of sorghum, potato, maize and cassava among others.
“Our breeders do not transfer genes from animal to plant except from plant to plant.
“The introgression of the genes is usually done among crops of the same species or sometimes, of different species but belonging to the same family,’’ Abdulazeez explained.
Speaking on behalf of bio-fortified Cassava and Potato Farmers, Mrs Carol Donko, said the business had been profitable.
She urged other farmers to key into the business to boost the production of high nutritional bio-fortified foods in the country.
The BNFB initiative is implemented through the CIP as the leading partner and International Center for Tropical Agriculture, International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center (CIMMYT), IITA, Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA) among others.
It is a three-year project from November 2015 to October 2018, which is being implemented in Nigeria and Tanzania.
The News Agency of Nigeria reports that at least $10 million investment had been devoted to bio-fortified crops programmes in Nigeria and Tanzania by the public, private and NGOs to support the initiative.