Since his assumption of office in May 2015, President Muhammadu Buhari has repeated said that the nation’s economy must be diversified to, especially Agriculture which “must cease from being treated as development programme but be treated as business. Our goal will be to pursue government supported private sector agriculture value chain to make agriculture more productive, efficient and competitive.”
The drastic fall of oil prices in the international market has directed the thinking of the Buhari administration to diversify the economy to, specifically agriculture and one possible means of doing this is the deployment of biotechnology. It serves as a tool for sustainable development in agriculture and could boost food security in Nigeria. It is therefore appropriate for the country in order to boost the production of maize, cotton, rice, beans, wheat, cassava, etc to, not only meet up with our consumption needs but also for the purpose of commercialization.
A good step is Nigeria’s adoption of biotechnology in agriculture through the Biotechnology Policy, which led the establishment of the National Biotechnology Development Agency (NABDA). And in order to address safety concerns, the National Bio-safety Management Agency (NBMA), a full-fledged agency that provides regulatory frameworks for sustainability has been established.
The GLP aggregated and excerpted this article to reflect the diversity of news, opinion and analysis. Read full, original post: How biotechnology can optimize agriculture in Nigeria