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The Agricultural Sector As The Key To The Diversification Of The Nigerian Economy For Sustanable Development
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The colonial government recognized the potential of the agricultural
sector to improve the Nigerian economy and therefore put in place
policies aimed at increasing output and to extract surpluses in the
sector. The main focus of development in this period was the surplus
extraction philosophy or policy whereby immense products were generated
from the rural areas to satisfy the demand for raw materials in
metropolitan Britain (Ayoola, 2001). This early interest of the
extractive policy was on forest resources and agricultural exports like
cocoa, coffee, rubber, groundnuts, oil palm, and cotton. The capitalist
agricultural policies of Nigeria since 1900 have remained basically
intact. No efforts have been made to fundamentally change them. The
nature of these agricultural policies and their impacts led to Nigeria’s
agricultural disorientation and the food crisis (Akor, 2009).
Meanwhile,
most of these policies were made without proper institutional
arrangement, programs, specific projects, strategies, goals or targets
and specific objectives geared towards the realization of these dreams
of the policies. This can be proved by the fact that there was only one
documented agriculture scheme that evolved towards the end of the era
(early 1960s) called the farm settlement scheme (Iwuchukwu &
Igbokwe, 2012). The imperialistic theoretical framework of the notions
of development and modernization have decisively influenced the Nigerian
agricultural policies since the colonial era. The rate and direction of
Nigeria’s agricultural development were therefore, determined by the
British colonialist and taken over by the neo-colonial Nigerian ruling
classes since 1960 (Akor, 2009).
The Nigeria’s agricultural
development was fully de-centralized with the regions and states
carrying out all activities while support was provided by the federal
government and this enabled a state/region specific approach. This
approach involved the combined efforts of small scale farmers/the
private sector and the government. This approach was very successful
during the period and thus with agriculture remaining the mainstay of
the Nigerian economy; providing employment, raw materials for
industries, the main source of foreign exchange earnings and also
sustaining the food security status of the populace. The appropriation
and utilization of Nigeria’s economic surplus by the colonial and neo
colonial imperialist powers is central to the analysis of the structural
distortions in the agricultural sector and Nigeria’s food crisis. The
central point in the imperialist relationship was the transfer of
economic surplus to strengthen the capitalist class and the capitalist
mode of production in Europe and North America (Akor, 2009).
However,
with the onset of the 1970’s, there was a national neglect of this
sector due to oil boom which practically led to a decline in the sector
(Abimiku, 2009). Despite the drastic decline, no matter how much
development and structural transformation will be achieved in Nigeria,
agriculture will continue to retain its relative dominance in the
economy for many decades to come. More importantly, it is from
agriculture and in particular from agricultural exports that the country
received its principal stimulus for economic growth in 1950s and 1960s.
It will remain a key factor in Nigeria’s economic development as the
largest employer of labour (about 72% of the labour force in 1970-1971),
the principal source of food and raw materials for the population and
industries and a significant though relatively declining earner of
foreign exchange. The acceleration of agricultural growth is therefore
crucial for the country’s future progress (Akor, 2009).
In the 1970’s, the policy instrument that was introduced by government
included a series of development plans at the national level. The
Structural Adjustment Program (SAP) in 1986 came up after this and
efforts were made at making the agricultural sector commercially
competitive and remunerative and also tried to redress Nigeria’s
defective mono-economic imbalance by diverse diversifying programs in
order to reduce dependence on the oil sector and also on imports. This
policy package focused on a rapid improvement of domestic food
production, the domestic supply of agricultural raw materials, the
production of exportable cash crops and also rural employment. The
client status of Nigeria in the international capitalist system is the
fundamental structural basis for imposing the abuses of underdevelopment
on the country (Akor, 2009).
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