Agriculture

Long a critical sector for the Nigerian economy, agriculture recorded steady growth throughout the country’s recent recession and supported macroeconomic stability against a backdrop of volatility in the global oil market. Although the sector’s workforce, exports and GDP contribution have fallen in recent decades, as oil and gas production became Nigeria’s economic mainstay, the country is home to vast amounts of arable land and a large, diverse production base that includes many high-value cash crops, offering significant opportunity for development and investment. Recognising the sector’s high growth and export potential, the federal government of Nigeria has increasingly focused on agricultural development as a support mechanism for macroeconomic and non-oil growth. This chapter contains an interview with Audu Ogbeh, Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development; and a roundtable with Chaim Zach, Managing Director and CEO, Agric International Technology and Trade; Kabiru Rabiu, Group Executive Director, BUA Group; and Aliyu Abbati Abdulhameed, Managing Director, Nigeria Incentive-Based Risk Sharing System for Agricultural Lending.