Speech: COVID-19 and its Implications on Food and Agriculture, Smallholder Women Farmers and Averting the Looming Food Crisis

Text of a joint virtual press conference addressed by the Country Director of ActionAid Nigeria, Mrs. Ene Obi on the 24th day of April 2020 on COVID-19 and its implications on Food and Agriculture, Smallholder Women Farmers and averting the looming food crisis in Nigeria. 

Ladies and Gentlemen of the press

ActionAid Nigeria and the Small-Scale Women Farmers Organisation in Nigeria (SWOFON) has deemed it fit to comment on the looming food crisis in Nigeria as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic which has crippled all sectors of the economy.

We commend the Federal and State Governments, and all stakeholders for their unrelenting efforts towards containing COVID-19 pandemic in Nigeria. 

However, we are calling the Government’s attention to the continual loss of income and livelihoods in the agricultural sector especially for smallholder women farmers, arising from the continued lockdown and restriction of movement.

Within this period, Farmers are experiencing massive post-harvest losses on fruits, vegetables, fresh products and other perishables due to lack of access to markets. Smallholder Women Farmers are unable to move their products from their farms to the market or from their rural communities to semi-urban and urban markets. They are also losing income from Staple food like Maize, Rice, Wheat, Potatoes, Cassava, Soybeans, Yams, Sorghum, and Plantain, etc. Those engaged in livestock farming especially poultry, are faced with a lack of access to poultry feeds they usually buy. Fisheries and aquaculture Farmers are also affected from the closure or low patronage of hotels and skeletal operations of restaurants. 

Before the emergence of COVID-19, smallholder women farmers were already faced with low and difficult access to credit, essential inputs, improved seeds and seedlings, organic and non-organic fertilizers. However, the spread of COVID-19 has now further compounded the situation as they now have no access at all. Being a planting season for Farmers, it is pertinent to say food crisis is already looming in Nigeria. 

Currently, there is a food price crisis across the country, the poor and vulnerable are facing hunger and malnutrition and this includes our smallholder women farmers. The security agencies and task forces enforcing the lockdown in the States, at the local government and community levels are incessantly harassing and extorting smallholder Farmers, especially women. 

As a result of the COVID-19 pandemic the world has changed so is Nigeria as a country. The High-Level Panel of Experts on Food Security and Nutrition (HPLE) of the UN Committee on World Food Security (CFS) has recently recommended that all government 

must support smallholder farmers and local communities through appropriate stimulus packages (in cash or kind) to enhance food resilience. It is against this back drop that ActionAid Nigeria and SWOFON duly recommend the following to avert the looming food crisis in Nigeria amidst this COVID-19 pandemic: 

1. We call on the federal government to announce clear policy interventions during this pandemic to ensure that there is sustained local food production and supply. During the President’s extension of the lockdown on Monday 13th April 2020, he said FMARD and other food agencies will work with the Presidential Task Force to minimise the impact of COVID-19 on our 2020 farming season. This also presents us as a nation an opportunity to become self-reliant in food production and completely wean ourselves from excessive food imports.
2. Special community local produce buying, and transportation should be arranged to buy produce from smallholder women farmers to ensure food supply is maintained.
3. Smallholder farmers especially women should be exempted from the movement restrictions while observing precautionary measures, so that they can go to their farms for work and carry their produce to the market.
4. Agricultural extension agents should be exempted from the movement restrictions, so they are able to provide extension services support to the farmers while maintaining physical distancing and other precautionary measures.
5. Special palliatives targeted at smallholder farmers especially women should be designed to provide for the needs of farmers as they are amongst the poor and vulnerable.
6. Social protection (unconditional or conditional cash transfers) must be provided to farmers and farm workers who are forced to leave their fields and are not able to take their goods to the market, invariably affecting their immediate household income and their investment in next season’s harvest. 
7. Grants, credit, essential inputs, early maturing livestock, improved seeds and seedlings, and fertilizers especially organic should be provided for smallholder farmers especially women in order to avert the looming food crisis.
8. Agroecology for climate change adaptation, mitigation and sustainable food production should be supported, promoted and funded by government at all level.
9. Face masks, hand gloves, sanitizers and access to clean water should be provided to farmers across Nigeria.
10. Farmers across Nigeria should be targeted specifically and sensitised on COVID-19.
11. The security agencies and taskforces both at the state, local and community levels should be directed to stop the harassment and extortion of farmers especially women. This should be monitored by the Divisional Police Officers across board and defaulting officers disciplined appropriately.

#END

Editors' notes 

ActionAid Nigeria (AAN) is a national non-governmental, non-partisan, non-religious, civil society organisation and an affiliate member of the ActionAid International Federation with presence in 45 countries. AAN works in solidarity with people living in poverty and exclusion to achieve social justice, gender equality and poverty eradication towards achieving a just, equitable and sustainable world in which every person enjoys the right to a life of dignity, freedom from poverty and all forms of oppression. ActionAid Nigeria is implementing the Public Financing of Agriculture (PFA) project to catalyse increased quantity and improved quality of public investment in agriculture through enhanced citizens’ participation in policy making process to increase the productivity and well-being of women smallholder farmers, their households and communities in Nigeria. 

Small Scale Women Farmers Organization in Nigeria (SWOFON) is a coalition of Women Farmers Associations and Groups across Nigeria. This network exists with the goal of advocating for and supporting women farmers especially those in rural areas to spur rural village economic development, increase food production through capacity building of smallholder women farmers to demand for their rights and privileges from the duty bearers while serving as vocal and visible pressure group on behalf smallholder women farmers in Nigeria.