The Minister of Agriculture and Food Security, Abubakar Kyari has said that the persistent food insecurity in the country reached its peak when traders and citizens decided to hoard food commodities while creating man-made scarcity.
Kyari disclosed this in Abuja at a special Ramadan lecture/Iftar organised by the Special Assistant to the President on Agriculture and Food Security, Mufutau Yinusa, themed Gratitude, Patience and Vision: Embracing Challenges with Optimism.
He acknowledged that despite insecurity being the major driver of food insecurity in the country, the rising cost of food items was exploited by citizens through market speculation while issuing a stern warning against hoarding and speculative trading as the Federal Government intensifies efforts to scale up food production in the country.
Hear him, Some of the problems we are facing are also man-made, for instance, hoarding and speculative trade by commodity traders is also very huge. We have seen and discovered some warehouses in big commodity areas where even gates are removed, and walls built just to hoard foodstuff inside.
So, when you look at those things and say its Bola Tinubu, I think we are not being fair to the administration of this government, so we have to look inward, we all have a role to play,.
The Agric minister reiterated the federal government’s commitment to ensure food security for the nation while addressing the insecurity challenge.
In his remark, the Minister of State for Agriculture and Food Security, Aliyu Abdullahi called on Muslims to use the Ramadan period to pray for the nation and its leaders.
