Many farmers, particularly those in remote villages, switched to trade by barter in order to feed, following the cash crunch caused by the naira redesign policy of the Central Bank of Nigeria, the All Farmers Association of Nigeria stated on Tuesday.
AFAN also stated that the latest findings by the association indicated that farmers lost about N30bn due to the naira crisis, adding that all arms of the agricultural sector were hit by the “painful CBN policy.”
READ ALSO: FMAN organizes brown field day in Jigawa, interacts, appraise farmers
The President, All Farmers Association of Nigeria, Kabir Ibrahim, told our correspondent that though the poultry sector was among the worst hit, other producers of agro-commodities also suffered severe losses.
“The policy caused so many hiccups, a lot of poultry farmers have over 10,000 crates of eggs that are unsold due to the cash crunch. However, we hope that the recent decision of CBN to release cash to banks would ameliorate the concerns.
“The losses were not only incurred by egg producers. The producers of vegetables, grains and almost all facets of the sector were affected. Some farmers could only feed through trade by barter. That is how bad the situation is in some remote areas.
“Vegetable farmers who want grains, exchange their vegetables for the grains. Also, farmers of grains exchange their products for some other crops, all in a bid to survive the hardship that was caused by the lack of cash for several months,” Ibrahim stated.
He urged the CBN to increase the release of cash, so that it could spread to villages and other remote areas across the country where farmers were practicing trade by barter.
