Agric/IT
World food agencies such as
the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) and World Food Programme have, on
several occasions, raised an alarm over the looming and impending danger of
food shortage in Nigeria. Both agencies, as of March 2018, said that it is
possible for food shortage to affect 5.8 million Nigerians.
Despite the large expanse of
land that cuts across the country from the North, South, East and West, it’s
very shocking and rather sad that there’s not enough food to go round.
But then, this was not the
case in the past. Agriculture was the mainstay of the Nigerian economy:
groundnut pyramids from the north; cocoa from the west; and kola nut from the
east.
In 1956, Nigeria struck
something sweeter and juicier than agriculture. On that fateful day, in the
village of Oloibiri, the country discovered oil and agriculture took a back
seat.
The country literarily
abdicated and abandoned every other sector for oil thus making the Nigerian
economy a mono-product economy. From one oil boom to another, Nigeria was
revelling in the pool of petrol dollars while agriculture that has the
possibility of gainfully employing and feeding Nigerians took the backseat.
Agriculture cried and cried for attention but was neglected. This is why some
people have described oil as a 'curse' rather than a blessing to the country.
Now, agriculture is very
frail and everyone including the government is running helter-skelter to revive
it. And oil has lost its fanfare.
Interestingly, technology
has a solution for almost every problem. In the case of agriculture, digital
farming is the tech innovation being used to solve the Nigerian food crises.
Digital farming or agriculture is the use of new and advanced technologies,
integrated into one system, to enable farmers and other stakeholders within the
agriculture value chain to improve food production.
How
digital farming works
Technology as earlier said
has a solution for almost everything. It simply depends on how you deploy it.
For those who 'hate' farming, digital farming is perfect for you. And the story
of digital farming is incomplete without referencing Farmcrowdy. Farmcrowdy can
be described as the first digital farm in Nigeria.
With digital farming, you do
not need to own a farm. You simply invest your money in any of the available
farms advertised on the digital farm platform and at the end of the harvesting
cycle, you get your return on investment plus interest. The reason why this
works is that digital farm platform provides support for farmers to guarantee
improved crop yield and preservation of harvest. This will, in turn, reduce
food waste and increase food production.
The eCommerce is a foolproof
business model that has been tried and tested by Jumia, Nigeria’s no 1 shopping
destination and it has really been successful so far. As such, it is nonplus
that the eCommerce business model is being replicated in other sectors of the
Nigerian economy.
Can
digital farming tackle food shortage in Nigeria?
Food shortage is a threat to
Nigeria's existence. This is not supposed to be the case in Nigeria because of
the availability of large expanse of fertile lands. Thankfully, digital farming
arrived and every Nigerian now has the opportunity to play a role in
Agriculture even though they do not need to work on the farm. This is the real
catch. Therefore, it is very possible for digital farming to tackle food
shortage.
Digital farmers cannot do it
alone. All stakeholders must come together to find a solution to the food
shortage crises in Nigeria. For now, the digital farmers can only do as much.
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