Early in the year there were cries everywhere about food shortage all over the world. There was real scarcity of rice and definitely an accompanying upsurge in price. This made a lot of us put on our thinking caps again. Nigeria should be a major rice producing country. All of sudden a vogue started in Nigeria. Our local breed of rice was being served at parties in leaves as was done in the olden days. Our local breed popularly referred to as “ofada” especially in in the Lagos, Ogun axis. Rice is richly cultivated in Ekiti, Edo, Abakaliki, Lagos and Ogun states, definitely breeds from these states vary,
Our leaders in these states should consider creating INVESTMENT out of this situation, these would bring adventurous businessmen into the country seeking to experiment with our various local rice breeds. Our local rice breeds have turned out to be very great delicacies. These various breeds in Nigeria will create an excitement in the world rice market. People are used to the regular long grain type of rice as made popular by the known world producers of rice Thailand et al. With some technology Nigeria can break into the world rice market as a major rice producer. Every sector in life comes with varieties, our local breed will come as an alternative to the usual.
This is where I believe businessmen from rice producing countries should come in with their experience and also technical expertise in Rice production. Even if the target is the local market initially. Our leaders and our financial institutions should look into rice cultivation and production as an investment window.