Activities of natural rubber producers in the agricultural sub-sector are facing critical times, as the producers said the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has blocked them from accessing funds and credit facilities.
The Chairman of the Natural Rubber Producers, Processors and Marketers Association of Nigeria (NARPPMAN), Mr Peter Igbinosun, speaking in Calabar, Cross River State, said the rubber subsector was being neglected by the authorities, which was affecting the 10,102 registered members of the association.
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Mr Igbinosun said, “Our association has been blocked from accessing authorities at the apex bank. We have applied for funds to resuscitate the dying natural rubber subsector but we are continually told that rubber is not the priority of the federal government. This is painful and tiresome.
“They said because rubber has a very long gestation period, therefore they have no funds to appropriate except for rice and other immediate economic crops that yield early enough.”
Igbinosun explained that rubber was so useful across households and businesses.
He said, “The health institutions depend on byproducts of rubber; our shoes, surgical gloves, mattresses, car tyres, name them, are all rubber. Yet they want to collectively kill the subsector. They should know that, ‘No Rubber, No Nation’.”
He, therefore, appealed that the subsector is given priority in funding; insisting that the producers employed over 300,000 persons directly and indirectly in Nigeria’s rubber value chain.
When contacted, the acting Director of Communication at CBN, Mr Osita Nwanisobi, said, “Who told them that rubber is not given priority? I am not aware of what they are saying. We want them to come up with facts that they are blocked from accessing funds or our authorities.”
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