SWOFON, BCS Lament Non-release Of Fund To Smallholder Women Farmers In Kogi

Smallholder Women Farmers Organisation of Nigeria (SWOFON) and Budget Committee Group (BCG) Kogi State chapter have lamented the persistent neglect of the sector by the Kogi State Government in the non-release of funds budgeted for the sector.

The group stated this weekend, during a stakeholders engagement  organised by SWOFON, and  Kogi State BCG on the 2025 Agriculture Budget Analysis, Observations and Recommendations held in Lokoja, the Kogi State capital.

Speaking during the engagement,  Rukayat  Ahmed of SWOFON and Mathias Okpanachi of BCG, decried the government’s lack of interest in the growth and development of smallholder farmers who bear a chunk of the burden of  producing foods for the state, adding that this was largely responsible for food insecurity and high  food prices in the state.

The groups also claimed that the three tractors allocated to the body in the 2025 budget have not been delivered, four months into the budget lifespan.

The groups equally noted with dismay that the smallholder farmers, who are the major producers of staple foods in the state, have often been neglected by the government’s deliberate refusal to cash back items allocated to them in the budget.

They explained that, even though there was marginal increase of 3.3% in 2024 budget, it sharply plummeted to 2.79% in 2025  budget which has become worrisome to the organisations.

While thanking the Government for improving the  Agriculture budget, the body said that all the efforts still remained a far cry from the Maputo declaration of 10%, stressing that the budget performance for actual farmers has been poor on threshold.

According to the groups , the Maputo declaration on Agriculture and food security, adopted by African heads of states at the AU’ s second ordinary Assembly in July 2003 include a key commitment of countries to allocate at least 10% of national and state budgets  to agriculture, saying that the state has often breached this declaration despite critical roles small holder farmers play  in the lives and livelihood of people of the state.

The groups painted a gloomy picture of government inaction in public finance for agriculture, agricultural finance and credit, provision of farm inputs, Extension Services, Agricultural mechanisation/labour-saving technologies, climate-resilient sustainable agriculture, research and development, post-harvest losses, Irrigation and Fadama agriculture, monitoring and evaluation.

It regretted that while the budget lines that will impact positively on food security and abundance performed poorly, those interventions that do not  directly benefit smallholder farmers, but , large scale farmers are fully and timely released.

” For instance, the budget releases for the procurement of tractors, power tillers and harvesters to boost food security and sale functioning of food supply chains for poor household (CARES) has 98% performance while procurement of agricultural inputs, equipment (FSTP) and others that will have direct impact on smallholder women farmers had zero performance in 2024 budget.”

The statement, however, charges Governor Ododo and his administration with prioritising policies and frameworks on agriculture, commercial agriculture credit scheme, extension Services, post-harvest loss reduction, women and youth, irrigation, labour-saving technologies, and agriculture inputs, among other things.