FG, France sign pact to design agrifood market strategy for Nigeria

The Federal Government of Nigeria, the French Embassy in Nigeria, the French Development Agency (AFD) and Semmaris have signed a grant agreement of 1.2 million Euros for the development of a strategy for agriculture and food markets in Nigeria.

The AFD grant will finance a one-year technical assistance programme to assist the Federal Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development (FMARD) in the design of a national agrifood market development strategy.

The one-year study, which will run from Q1 2023 to Q1 2024, will look at the whole value chains market ecosystem from rural to urban areas, with a particular focus on the three largest urban consumption areas in Nigeria: Lagos-Ibadan, Kano-Kaduna and Owerri-Port-Harcourt.

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The study will result in an inventory of existing agricultural markets; an in-depth analysis of current distribution channels and agrifood logistics; a legal and regulatory framework adapted to market development, and technical recommendations to rehabilitate or build three terminal markets.

The programme will be implemented by the French company, Semmaris, with the support of the Federal Project Management Unit (FPMU) of the Rural Access and Agricultural Marketing Project (RAAMP) within the FMARD.

Semmaris has been managing for over 50 years the largest wholesale fresh food market worldwide in Rungis, France.

The Rungis Market brings together over 1,200 companies from various segments of the food value chains.

This initiative will build on the 10-year intervention of the World Bank and AFD in the rural development sector in Nigeria through the “Rural Access and Mobility Project” (RAMP) achieved in 2021, and the on-going “Rural Access and Agricultural Marketing Project” (RAAMP) (2020-2028) co-financed by AFD and WB for a total investment of EUR 700 M including EUR 296 M from AFD.

These projects will contribute to reducing post-harvest losses through the rehabilitation of over 2 000km of all-season rural roads and the upgrading of 65 collection markets into agro-logistics hubs in 19 States across the country.

In Nigeria, agriculture accounts for 22% of GDP in 2020 and employs 70% of the formal and informal working population.

Nigeria is a major producer of roots and tubers (world’s leading producer of cassava, large producer of taro and yam), cereals (maize, rice, sorghum), cocoa and palm oil.

The country’s agriculture is characterized by small, low-productivity family farms, which practice low-mechanized subsistence rain-fed agriculture.

Eighty percent of farmers are smallholders and provide a total of 90% of the country’s agricultural production.

Despite growing agricultural production, imports of agri-food products are increasing while 30 to 40% of crops are said to be lost on site due to lack of access to roads and markets.

This study will contribute to structuring a food value chain and strengthen agri-food systems while also helping to identify the terminal markets that should be rehabilitated or newly built in the outskirts of cities, linking up Nigeria’s major urban consumption areas to rural areas that are benefitting from AFD and World Bank’s past and on-going interventions.

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