Nigerias agriculture minister, audu ogbeh. When president buhari came to power 18 months ago, he raised hopes that he would reform the country. Instead, nigeria is involved in its worst recession for 20 years. There is widespread Food Insecurity in the north and growing unrest. Why cant this Oil Rich Nation with plenty of farmland feed its own people and enjoy greater stability . Minister audu ogbeh, welcome to hardtalk. Thank you very much for inviting me here. Weve seen 2 Million People displaced by boko haram in the north of nigeria. Terrible Food Insecurity there now. The Un Humanitarian Office is warning of severe food shortages. Nearly half a million children face acute malnutrition and that people will die if aid is not given. Are you managing to get these people some food to eat . We are managing to get them some food. My ministry sent over 10,000 tonnes of grain, about four months ago. On a regular basis the National EmergencyManagement Authority sends anything up to half a Million Tonnes of grain to north east. This is not to say that thats absolutely enough to feed them, but food is being rushed to the north east almost on a weekly basis. And you can categorically say that people will not die in Northern Nigeria . A few will die, a certain number will, because they are moving back to their villages now. Its too late. What does a certain number mean, minister . You could have a few thousand probably not getting enough food, especially the children, in the camps. Because they have special kinds of food they need to eat. We are importing out any single time now. I just approved about ten shiploads, ten aircraft loads of ready to use Food Materials from Western Europe to be delivered to children in the camps. Because they cant eat the kind of food is the adult seat. Milk, you know, soya beans, protein enriched foods like that for the children to eat. But definitely many will go through hardship. But you just said that you believe that thousands, including many children, could die. Many could die, if the programmes are sustained, they went. If there is any halt in them, or any difficulties in the way of deliveries, a number will die. I cant be precise. Are you saying here, now, that you are appealing for more help to prevent those deaths . As much help as we can get, but at home we are doing a whole lot of work. I am a member of a National Committee for delivering food to the north east, especially because i am in the ministry of agriculture, but other agencies, the red cross, the National EmergencyManagement Authority, organisations like the dangote group, are sending things to the north east like rice and beans and yams and so on on a daily basis. But what you have got to do is to ensure that these people enjoy some stability, and that means really defeating boko haram, who have been responsible for many atrocities. We all know about the schoolgirls who were kidnapped and so on. President buhari says, we are getting the better of them. But the International Crisis group says that there is still substantial resistance by boko haram. This is a war you cannot win in one day. It is not a regular war. If it was, the Nigerian Army is capable of dealing with it. Number two, people must remember, when it came in initially, the handling im notjust here to criticise the previous government was extremely poor. President buhari came in and how to restructure the army. To put them in a position to put boko haram on the run. It will not end overnight, i can assure you. But is the Nigerian Army properly equipped to fight boko haram . Let me tell you what a Security Analyst based in lagos says. He says, you cant send men to fight boko haram wearing flip flops and rusty rifles with no ammunition, that is not going to work. Hes right, isnt he . Well, i dont know who he is, or whether he has been On The Waterfront. He is with the Pilgrims Africa security company, which is based in lagos. How often has he been On The Waterfront . Sometimes, commentators far away from the front can comment and it makes it look like nobody is doing any work. But, rifles and tanks and weapons of all kinds have to be bought. But its also a question of inspiring trust and confidence amongst people in your country about the abilities of the security forces. If that situation had not changed, some would not have been captured. Even the people in borno state themselves will tell you that things are a lot better, they have more hope and more confidence. Well, let me tell you what happened in borno state, and you know very well yourself, minister, thats nearly 100 people died because the Nigerian Air Force accidentally hit a refugee camp in borno state. A very tragic occurrence. It is not going to Inspire Trust, though, is it . Didnt the us army hit Russian Troops in syria . Didnt they apologise for it . If we talk to the americans, well put these things to them. Friendly fire, and so on. Things happen in warfare. Nobody can imagine that the Nigerian Air Force deliberately bombed a refugee camp. I didnt say that. I said it doesnt Inspire Trust and confidence in the military. Accidents do happen. We regret it, we are sad about it, it shouldnt have happened, but these things do happen. The president is mounting an enquiry. Why did it happen . Somebody has to be called to account for it. And will there be resignations . I do not know yet, it depends on the findings. But the fact is, it is not just boko haram. You say you are getting the better of boko haram and i put it to you that you have got armrests now from the islamic movement, a shia group in Northern Nigeria, 300 people were killed in kaduna state in 2016. Weve also got in the South East Biafra separatists. We all remember the Terrible Biafra War in 1967 70. And youve got conflicts between pastoralists and farmers spreading across the country, leading to deaths. So, really, youve got so much in your hands. Its notjust boko haram. We have a lot on our hands. We are working towards solving them. I mean, this is a country of 193 Million People. A country hit by severe economic recession. And people have started reacting in different ways. I mean, boko haram was a product of a certain amount of neglect and, perhaps, indifference to the real issues in the economy. We got caught by what they called the dutch disease. Oil and gas came in and local production literally halted in agriculture and manufacturing. The long term effects of these uprisings are driven mainly by lack of inclusion and perhaps lack of internal productivity and activity in the economy. And you are seeing that now in the south east with the Biafra Separatists who was saying, we are not treated fairly by the federal government. In may, there were a0 deaths in 0nitsha, Amnesty International say, you know, that police opened fire on civilians. There is no part of the country you go to where you dont find people telling you they are not well treated. Each of these states. Nigeria has 36 states. Each state has an autonomous government of its own. Everybody blames only the president at the centre. It doesnt always make sense. But the fact is. You have alluded to it. Nigeria is a deeply divided country. Thats what a un report said in 2016. It also said, since independence, nigeria has struggled to build and sustain national integration. For decades, different segments of nigerias population have at times expressed fears of marginalisation. Everybody complains of marginalisation. There is always one group saying we have been left out of the scheme. What is there to share . The general revenue from oil and gas. There is a formula for distribution to the states. They get their own share of the revenue. But every still blames the federal government for marginalisation. You know why they complain we havent had enough of our people appointed to certain key positions at the centre. Lets look at agriculture, because thats your ministry. Now, nigeria spends 22 billion every year importing food. It got so much agricultural land, yet more than half of it goes unfarmed. Thats tragic. It is tragic, because once we got into this habit of importing, because there was oil revenue to bring in the rice, the sugar, the milk, people simply gave up on agriculture. A crisis among the elite. Banks wouldnt lend money to agriculture. They lent money to. It was at 25 . And that remains the Lending Average in nigeria, even today. So we gave up on agriculture. Now, we have no more returns from oil and gas, we are short of food and everybodys realising that we made a serious mistake and we have to correct it. Which is exactly what were doing. But it has. It is amazing, because, in the 1970s, nigeria was an agricultural superpower. Before we got oil and gas. In africa. Absolutely. You were number two in cocoa production, you were groundnut exporters, exported palm oil. You now have to import your palm oil. People just relied on oil . Everybody relied on oil and gas. In a way, it is good that we are facing a new reality. Get back to agriculture. That is your Core Competence as a nation. And believe me, we are working at it. This year alone, we are almost close to stopping the importation of rice, which cost us 5 million a day over a period of nearly 30 years. We are about to end it. We can do it, we have decided to do it, we have the support of the president and many of the state governors are working on it, and i assure you, it another year, we may be selling rice to somebody else. But, you know, a lot of people, i think including you, will agree that when it comes to the smallholder farmers in nigeria and most of the farmers are, of course, smallholders, but also agribusiness, high borrowing rates have made it practically impossible for them to scale up production. Absolutely. They want to borrow, but they cant, and the banks are not lending. A tiny fraction of nigerian banks lending goes to local agricultural production. Almost zero now, because they lend to traders, to importers, not to the farmers. But you just said you were getting to grips with the problem. We have found a way out. This bank has intervened and the bank of agriculture has been restructured. Just two days ago i had a meeting before i came here to fix finances to support lending to agriculture at a single digit. And it is because of the Central Banks intervention, direct intervention, criticised by some economists, which has worked for us. The Rice Production and Grain Production has gone up phenomenally in the last 12 months. We have to work it out. We cant rely on the commercial banks. The bank of agriculture will come into place. And then the Interest Rates we charge will be the average, that farmers can manage. The good news is that the yields on farms have risen because we did a soil map of nigeria, change the Fertiliser Application Formula and farmers have yielded up from two tonnes a hectare, to seven and a half. And that has made it more safe for them to go back to the farm. One of your predecessors as agriculture minister, akin adesina, now president of the African Development bank, says agriculture is really, really important, it employs two thirds of the workforce in nigeria, 28 now of gdp comes from agriculture in nigeria. But he says youve got to bake farming sexy, so that all those young nigerians want to work in farming and notjust all go to the cities. Are you making farming sexy . Absolutely. Ill tell you the story of a young man i saw in kebbi state. Kebbi is about 1,000 miles from lagos, 1,000 kilometres. And he was wearing a t shirt. The t shirt bore the name of a local politician in lagos. I saw him in kebbi and i said, where did you meet that family . He said, oh, i was under the bridge in lagos for one year, nearly starved to death, until i heard that rice growing was taking place in my state and i got back home. And in one year i made more than half a Million Naira in income. The young men and women are returning to agriculture. On a large scale. Because we are buying them equipment, giving them good seeds, preparing land of them, and increasing the number of tractors on the farms. Its the only way of doing it. But, as things stand, nigeria still depends on oil and gas for 90 of its Export Earnings and about 70 of state revenues. When do you really think we are going to see that greater diversification in the nigerian economy so that those figures go down . There is a simple strategy. In another year, we will be absolutely self sufficient in the local staples. We are number two in the world in sorghum, number three in millet. So you could halve your import bill . Absolutely. We are stopping rice importation. Thats cutting 5 million a day from the import bill in another year. Once that is done, we move to exports. Cocoa, cashew, sesame seed, pulses from india, cassava. 0k. And if you really want to boost your agricultural earnings, youre going to have to give some added value to your raw product. Let me give you one example. Nigeria accounts for about 11 of africas total tomato production, yet you spend 100 million a year on importing tomato puree from china and italy. Itjust doesnt make sense. Tomato paste producers, from certain parts of the world, continue to lower their prices to make a local production in nigeria unprofitable. Who are you saying is doing that . Some countries from the far east. The one thats name begins with c . Probably. Were saying, listen, we need to create jobs for our people, especially women in agriculture, and they keep lowering the prices, so we have an alternative. Either ban their products altogether, or raise the duties, because we cant keep satisfying the sentiment of so called free trade sentiments. Ok, but that is one side of the argument, but youve also got to make sure you have proper processing plants, canning facilities, people who have the skills. Precisely what im telling you. To make puree out of the tomatoes. One of the biggest puree plants in africa it cant operate because if it buys the tomatoes from the local farmers, processes at home, the prices will be a bit higher than the imported. But those importing to us are subsidising their commodities. But when that happens, thats when nigeria and other african countries, of course in the same situation, will really start boosting your Export Earnings from something other than oil. So as i said, things stand at the moment that you depend on oil, and we are seeing the activities of the militants of the niger delta, the Oil Producing region of nigeria, the niger delta avengers. There have been attempts to have negotiations with the government, but they have said that they are renewing their campaign for a wholesale destruction of nigerias Oil Production in 2017. Youre going to face a tough year. The Vice President of nigeria was there just monday morning before he flew here for the davos conference. He has met with them. The talks going on at the highest level between the Nigerian Government and the militants. A number of us believe that perhaps really we need to take steps to evolve and engage in war of the niger delta citizens in the oil industry, to guarantee peace and equity. By doing one or two things. Build a few more refineries in that zone. Let the shareholding belong to these members of those communities, so they become part of the exploration and exploitation of the resource in their region. I think that language and that message we will probably begin to see shortly and then we can find peace. So you are optimistic on that . Absolutely. But all this comes at a time when nigeria is deeply engulfed in recession. The worst for decades. You have inflation about 18 . Your growth last year was negative. You have high levels of unemployment. About an 11 billion budget deficit. Even president buhari himself, in september, said, nigeria suddenly seems to be a poor country. Where are you going to get the money to do all the things you say that you want to . Two things will happen. Economists tell you you have to spend your way out of recession. If you have to spend your way out of recession, you have to find the money to spend. Where is that money going to come from . If you dont have the money, you can borrow. But people arent borrowing for you. Lenders like the world bank have said, we dont want to lend money to nigeria because we dont think president buhari is carrying out the reforms that we would like him to. But some of the reforms they are asking for is further devaluation of the currency, which is making life more miserable at home. If you go taking new measures that make people unhappier, and there is a revolt at home, then they say, 0k, there is too much chaos in your country. Youre referring to the fact that the naira is allowed to float and we saw a depreciation of about 40 of its value. Exactly, because as long as your import dependent, you keep weakening your currency. There is no end to it. Two things will happen. Cut down your food bill, which we will, in another year. I can assure you Food Importation will drop so drastically, the world wont believe it, and we will become major exporters. Right now, we feed west, north and