Nigeria’s Self-Sufficiency in Rice and Wheat: An Evaluation of Growth Enhancement Support Scheme (GESS) and Anchor Borrower Program (ABP)

Abstract

This paper revisit one of Nigeria’s paradox: net food importer (especially in rice and wheat) accompanied by huge import bill running into billions of Naira despite huge agricultural potentials of 82 million hectares of arable land, conducive agro-ecology system for varieties of crops and dynamics smallholder farmers; Growth Enhancement Support Scheme (GESS, 2011) and Anchor Barrower Programs (ABP,2015) are among various initiatives aimed at boosting domestic production capacity particularly of rice and wheat; reduced importation and import bills and consequently conserve scarce foreign exchange. Base on before-and-after approach of evaluating policies and programs, a regression approach to single factor Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) was used to determine whether significant mean difference exist on area harvested, domestic production and import of rice and wheat in Nigeria before (1988-2009) and after (2010-2019) the implementation of the two programs. The findings indicate a significant and moderate increase in Nigeria’s capacity to produce more rice and wheat respectively; and the programs have not drastically reduced rice and wheat importation in Nigeria. The paper recommends expansion and sustainability of the programs with emphasis on wheat, quality output and competitive price, if Nigeria is serious about achieving self-sufficiency in rice and wheat.