Agriculture specialists and stakeholders from South-South Nigeria have advocated for sustainability in local rice production in order to render imported rice totally unattractive to consumers.
It was reported that respondents from the geopolitical region also assert that production and consumption of local rice is beneficial to the country as the Nigerian rice is more nutritious, tastier and cheaper than the foreign one. They said consumption of locally produced rice created wealth and enabled the country to save foreign exchange.
An agro- industry and value chain expert, Chijioke Osuji said Nigeria in the past two years had achieved self-sufficiency in rice production to a great extent. He however stressed the need to sustain the production of the staple food, something which he noted had always been a challenge in the country.
Also, Chairman, Rice Farmers, Processors, Producers, Millers and Marketers Association of Nigeria, Rivers state chapter, Akandu Godwin, said Nigerians had a lot to gain from production and consumption of local rice. He also agreed that the importance of local rice production ranged from availability of food to job creation.
An agriculturist, Timothy Funpere, in Yenagoa, Bayelsa, noted that since the ban on importation of rice, locally produced rice had become the favorite of many households in the state. He added that the price of available foreign rice has jumped between 12,500 naira and 14, 500 naira to 30,000 naira while local rice is sold for 26,000 naira.
