Agric Minister Says Ranches For Fulani Herdsmen May Not Solve Crisis

The creation of ranches for Fulani herdsmen may not be the solution to the recurring crisis between farmers and herdsmen in Nigeria, the Minister of … Continue reading Agric Minister Says Ranches For Fulani Herdsmen May Not Solve Crisis


Akinwunmi-AdesinaThe creation of ranches for Fulani herdsmen may not be the solution to the recurring crisis between farmers and herdsmen in Nigeria, the Minister of Agriculture has said.

At a meeting with journalists in Abuja on Saturday, Dr Akinwunmi Adesina, said the Federal Government understood some of the factors contributing to the crisis.

He said the crisis was an unfortunate outcome of the factors which include the need to gazette more grazing reserves.

“The government is determined to address the issues squarely.

“We cannot say let there be ranches and there will be ranches. We have to be realistic, pragmatic and sequential about it.

“The President has appointed a committee, which I chair, to look at the issue. What is driving the problem is more than what you see,” he said, citing climate change as a major driver of the crisis.

He explained that countries Niger, Mali, Burkina Faso and the Mauritania were losing a lot of vegetation because of hot environment due to desertification, which had resulted in the movement of herdsmen down to Nigeria.

“So we are having more animals in Nigeria than our own. Our animals are not so much that they will give us troubles.

“The second problem is urbanisation and we have encroachment between farmers and some of the grazing reserves,” the Minister of Agriculture said.

There are a total of 415 grazing reserves in Nigeria but only about 100 of them are gazetted, a development Mr Adesina pointed out needed to be addressed by gazetting other grazing reserves and improving the grazing facilities in the area.

There have been several clashes between suspected Fulani Herdsmen and farmers in the north central part of Nigeria, a development that had led to the signing of a peace agreement brokered by the police, which many said had not yielded result, as clashes between both groups had occurred after the agreement was signed.