A Professor of Crop Production at the Federal University of Agriculture Abeokuta (FUNAAB),Victor Olowe,has advocated for stronger ties between researchers and local farmers before concluding on their research topics.
The don who made the call on Wednesday while delivering the 63rd Inaugural Lecture of the university titled "Unlocking the Production Potentials of Some Annual Oilseed Crops in Nigeria", said such alliance would assist Nigeria achieve food security.
He lamented that most of the local farmers in the country lacked the needed knowledge and skill to be able to deploy technological gadgets on their farms.
Prof. Olowe stressed the need to include local farmers when a research topic is being conceived and planned for execution
He explains that the inclusion of local farmers is essential for the growth of small to medium scale farm produce, which is about 90 percent of the food consumed in tropical Africa.
He also charged the Federal Government on the need to massively-invest in oil extraction and value addition technology in order to drive the growth of the vegetable oil sector and meet her National Consumption Requirement (NCR).
The Professor of Crop Production emphasised the need to increase the production levels of minor oilseeds in Nigeria, saying this will help encourage production of the oilseeds with export potentials.
According to him, "if the country must meet her NCR in vegetable oil (3 million tonnes) and the deficit of over 600,000 tonnes, then the current production potential must be increased in order to drive the growth of the vegetable oil sector going forward".
Speaking on the theme, the Inaugural Lecturer disclosed that the two leading providers of edible vegetable oil in Nigeria are palm oil/palm kernel oil and soybean oil, which contribute about 75 percent and 25 percent of the country's NCR, adding that the remaining 5 percent is met by other oilseeds.
He noted that apart from oil palm and soybeans, other oilseed crops are normally regarded as 'minor oilseeds' in the tropics because farmers usually grow them after harvesting the main crops/cereals from the field leaving them to utilise residue nutrients and moisture without any application of fertilizer.
Prof. Olowe revealed that farmers usually grow them late because they believed they would get something from the minor oilseed during the last two or three months of the late cropping season in the year. He however stated that most of the so called minor oilseeds have gradually transformed into major oilseed crop status.
He further noted that in the last two to three decades, it has been discovered that soybeans, sesame and sunflower have huge agro-climatic production potential which have substantial market demand especially in Europe and Asia, adding that this potential is yet to be adequately harnessed in the forest savanna transition ecology which is outside the savanna traditional growing region for the crops.
He however called for a concerted effort to be geared towards increasing the production of major oil-bearing crops in Nigeria, stating that the oilseeds produce very comparable and high quality grain yields when cultivated during the late cropping season.
He further suggested that all National Agricultural Research Institutes (NARIs) should be adequately funded to have a full complement of the value chains of their mandate crops, adding that there should also be a synergy between the NARIs and the Colleges/Faculties of Agriculture in the specialized and conventional universities should be strengthened.
He commended the Vice Chancellor, Prof. Kolawole Salako, for his immense contributions to the development of FUNAAB, and appreciated all members of Staff of IFSERAR for their support and encouragement
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