The Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Audu Ogbeh, has said that export Nigeria, will by June 29, 2017, start exporting yams to Europe.

He said this in Abuja while speaking with journalists, stating that within the next two years, Nigeria’s agricultural sector would have improved. 

“On the 29th of June this year, the first container of yams will be leaving the shores of Nigeria for UK.

“Yes, we have been dealing with vegetables and a lot of other produce already and we will continue to be selling pulses mainly beans and cowpeas to India.

“The processed cashew nuts will be exported to Wal-Mart and other major supermarkets across the globe.

“We are on our way. It is just about time.

“We only have the challenge, now, of giving them what they need, and we will definitely meet that challenge.”

On the exportation of processed food as against raw farm produce, Ogbeh said that Nigeria had all it takes to effectively play in the international processed food market, stressing that most of what Nigerians ate were already processed foods.

“We have to process what we grow. There are very few things we eat raw especially vegetables and fruits. But rice, sugar, milk, sorghum, millet, cassava – among those items; we are almost there.

“Nigerians may find that difficult to accept now because the prices are so high and that can be explained by the sudden drop in the value of the Naira. Machineries need to be procured. We need to stabilize electricity otherwise the cost of production and processing gets too high.

“Otherwise, there is no question whether Nigeria can or will get there. It is just a matter of time.

“Unfortunately, for agriculture once a country slows down like we did for nearly 30 years, it becomes difficult to restart the engine.

“But for Nigeria, the people are incredible and they are doing it. It took Brazil 30 years and India 50 years to be able to get to where they are now. It won’t take us that long.