Farmers in Benue State may be forced to buy fertilizers, seeds and other inputs from the open market to meet up with 2014 planting season, as the state is yet to flag-off its much touted Growth Enhancement Scheme (GES), after spending millions of Naira to inaugurate the project.
The programme, which was created by the current government to subsidise the cost of inputs to farmers, has been bogged by controversies in the state, as the farmers have been kept on an endless wait for the list of agro-dealers approved to run the programme this year.
The delay, it was gathered, has been due to disagreement over who should be on the list of approved agro-dealers for this year, as some of those who participated in the successful roll out last year have been allegedly dropped for the current year.
Some of the dealers, who spoke with our Correspondent anonymously, have accused the current commissioner of Agriculture in the State, Mr. Donald Gboghu, of edging them out to pave way for an agro dealer firm they alleged has the name of the wife and son as directors.
They have also alleged that the commissioner has either decimated or completely delisted not less than 10 agro-dealers that performed creditably in the 2013 GES exercise as certified by the project.
The agro-dealers in Benue have reportedly invested over N1billion proceeds of bank loans in the inputs awaiting distribution for which they will be unable to repay easily if they are left out of the scheme. “The success of the GES in Benue State is now going to be a thing of the past as the new Commissioner for Agriculture has moved to take over the GES as a super agro-dealer by muzzling out a lot of the existing agro-dealers,” an agro-dealer who claims his firm was also delisted said.
This, they said, is contrary to a directive affirmed to after due briefing at the Northern Zone GES stakeholders meeting which held at Minna, where it was gathered that the State Director of Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development (FMARD), and Benue State GES Coordinator Mr. James Ker, under the guidance of the IFDC state representative produced a list of the agro-dealers and the respective locations they were going to operate in during the GES 2014.
According to the aggrieved agro-dealers, the list was produced in line with the guidelines laid down by the Honourable Minister of Agriculture Dr. Akinwumi Adesina.
The Benue State Director of FMARD, Mr. Benjamin Kulev, who confirmed the development from his hospital bed in Makurdi, however said that the state was awaiting orders from Abuja. He, however, added that the GES template to be used in Benue is same as that used in any other state as approved by the FMARD.
Meanwhile the aggrieved agro dealers in the state have said they are ready to leave everything to reason, as the issue, it was gathered, has been tabled before the Benue State governor.
Attempts to get the state’s Chairman of Agro Dealers Association to talk was unsuccessful as his phone was out of reach. Meanwhile, the GES is currently at a standstill in the state as some of the agro-dealers have said they may contemplate legal actions if the procurement process and the relevant laws governing the behaviour of public office holders are not adhered to. They are also concerned that their financiers have become weary in the face of the current uncertainties.
