Akinwunmi Adesina is no doubt a brilliant agricultural economist. We all felt proud when he was elected to the exalted position of president of the African Development Bank Group. But I have had occasion to disagree with him over his approach to agricultural policy. On more than one occasion he cast aspersion on the hoe, a technology that has been associated with African farming for the better part of a millennium. I myself look to the day when all our farms will have tractors and combined harvesters instead of the primitive hoe. Unfortunately, technologies do not change that quickly. The majority of our farmers are illiterate peasants who still use the hoe and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future. I fear that either he did not know about the Green Revolution in Asia or the lessons were simply lost on him. That revolution was largely based on the peasant farmer, not out of any romantic illusion about what the Old Russian Bolsheviks termed the ‘narodniki’. It was simply because the peasants are the majority and any policy that keeps the majority out of the equation would simply amount to ploughing the wind. There has to be a place for modern mechanised agribusiness, but peasant farmer has to be the cornerstone our agricultural transformation. When the agrarian sector has guaranteed food security, it is easier to build on that to enhance the value chain and bring about agro-industrial revolution throughout our country.
Sadly, he was busy again repeating the same thing in his maiden address as president-elect of the AfDB Group. What the majority of Africans need today – a position taken by no less than the Summit of Heads of State – is an industrial-technological revolution. Food security is a vital pillar and cornerstone for that industrial-technological transformation. Agriculture can only serve as a vehicle for food security and for advancing that longer-term objective of structural transformation.
I would imagine that Adesina would prefer that the Olams, Monsantos and Syngentas of this world take over all our agricultural farmlands. Yes, agriculture needs to be seen as a “business”, but, I would say, not necessarily a business controlled by land-grabbing multinational agricultural firms that are secretly utilising artificially manufactured new seed varieties.
Rather, we should be encouraging firms such as Nigerian Breweries PLC that are directly involved in farm activities while also patronising local corn farmers. On this score, I have to recuse myself, as some may accuse me of lack of transparent objectivity. I happen to be on the board of that organisation. The NBL brand is one of the best in corporate Nigeria; an outstanding organisation that is well managed, employing thousands and bringing considerable tax revenue to government and returns to shareholders. They are a real leaven to the agricultural value chain. What I worry about are land-grabbing foreign firms that are displacing peasants in Taraba, Benue and elsewhere.
Some 18 percent of respondents considered education as another important achievement of the government. Former President Jonathan, to give credit where it is due, has done more for education than any other president, living or dead. He founded nearly a dozen new federal universities, expanded the scope for private institutions and enhanced the salaries of the professoriate.
During our time it was the most brilliant minds who remained to teach in the universities. The average ones went into banking and the oil industry. When the universities were brought to their knees by the semi-literate military junta, the best minds fled abroad while a good number went into banking and the oil and gas sector. Ominously, the plodders became the professors. It is a dangerous development. These were the kind of people who felt nothing about selling grades and handouts and pestering young female students for sex in exchange of grades. Throughout my years as an undergraduate of Ahmadu Bello University, such a thing was never ever heard of. The system collapsed after our time and the citadels of learning became, sadly, an open cesspool of cultism, whoredom and violence. Today, some of those who call themselves “graduates” cannot pass the most basic of international literacy tests.
Under Goodluck Jonathan, a considerable amount of sanity and dignity has returned to the academy. Agencies such as TETFUND, headed by the brilliant and highly capable Professor Suleiman Elias Bogoro, have been doing a lot in funding research and modernising infrastructures and facilities throughout the tertiary sector.
Interestingly, the aviation sector was also credited with 10 percent as another achievement of the preceding regime. It seems clear that Stella Oduah, former Aviation Minister, did a lot for the sector, in spite of the embarrassing saga of the bullet-proof cars that led to her removal as minister. Under the dynamic Osita Chidoka, some visible improvements took place in our airports. The cultic-inspired plane crashes that bedevilled the Obasanjo years have become a thing of the past.
This is not to say that the aviation sector has reached its optimal best in terms of performance. Far from it. As people jostle for jobs in the new government, some of the most ferocious battles and intrigues centre on who is best fit to lead the sector. Vested interests and all sorts of notoriously corrupt individuals who have wrecked the system in the past are repositioning themselves to capture the sector and continue their nefarious activities as they always have. We hope and pray that President Muhammadu Buhari (PMB) will discomfiture them and appoint an independent-minded professional who will clean up the sector and restore sanity.
Finally, the NOI Polls asked a third question relating to what three key sectors the new PMB administration should be prioritising. The outcomes were again very fascinating. Some 55 percent singled out power as the single most important priority, followed by security (41 percent) and education (34 percent). It is intriguing that while singling out corruption as the most important challenge to our democracy (32 percent), the respondents did not list it among the top three priorities for the incoming administration.
OBADIAH MAILAFIA
