Small holder women farmers seek inclusion in agricultural policies

Small holder women farmers have called on government and other stakeholders to involve them in all policies in the agricultural sector.

Speaking separately at a round table organized for them by the Women Advocates’ Research and Documentation Centre (WARDC) in Abuja, they said they had been neglected for long and are not carried along in policy decisions concerning them.

A farmer from Benue state, Stella Zar said women farmers in her state suffered poor market, and unavailable fertilizers, and when available people holding political offices hijack them, and peg their prices beyond the reach of local farmers.

She said government should provide equipment for farmers in the villages, and the sharing of fertilizers should be properly monitored so that it reaches women farmers in the grassroots.

“At times we hear there is fertilizer in the state capital, and they even ask us to fill forms and apply. But at the end we get nothing,” she said.

Another farmer, Chief Janet Olaleye said government intervention for farmers in the state are mostly cornered by people who are not real farmers.

“It is the ‘agric people on paper’ who often benefit instead of the local people who produce food for the state. We produce oranges, snail and many crops and livestock but because of poor market, we end up selling them at the rates the buyers want and not how we want to sell,” she explained.

Olaleye who is also the secretary of the women wing of the All African Farmers Association of Nigeria, Osun Sate Chapter, called on government at all levels to give small holder women farmers more recognition, spread credit facilities to the grassroots and provide processing facilities.