Nigeria’s quest for food security is being hindered by poor access to credit, outdated farming techniques, and weak infrastructure, stakeholders warned at the BusinessDay Future of Agriculture Conference in Lagos Thursday.
Industry experts at the convening themed “Moving Nigeria from Scarcity to Food Security,” called for urgent policy changes, expanded agricultural financing, and large-scale mechanisation to boost productivity and reduce reliance on food imports.
Femi Adekoya, founder of Integrated Aerial Precision, stated that Nigeria has reached a point where technology is indispensable in farming activities. “Technology saves time in farming. It saves time, makes things easier for the farmer, and can produce more food in less time than more farmers can.”
He explained that with advancements such as drone technology and precision farming, farmers could increase efficiency while protecting themselves from hazardous substances and diseases that may spread from plants to humans.
“With technology, especially drone technology, farmers can plant on more than 100 hectares of farmland in a day. They are also protected from hazardous substances that can be spread by certain plant pests,” he said.
“This is because with technology these pests can be caught before they cause harm to plants and the farmer.”
Despite the potential, financing remains a critical roadblock
Kola Masha, managing director of Babban Gona, stressed that agrifinance is the missing link in unlocking the country’s agricultural potential. He argued that if Nigeria fully utilised its 34 million hectares of arable land, agricultural output could skyrocket.
According to him, achieving uniform average yields across maize farms could push production to 12 million tonnes, creating a demand large enough to absorb Dangote’s entire fertiliser output and catapult the sector to meet the country’s agric needs
However, with unreachable lending rates, Masha described the sector as “unviable” for smallholder farmers who dominate food production.
Read also: Lagos unveils 3-pillar proposal to address Nigeria’s food insecurity
He urged banks to adopt Banking as a Service (BAAS) models, which seamlessly integrate banks and agrifarmers, providing smallholder farmers with essential inputs while unlocking wealth for agro-processors.
“The scalability of agrifinance means it can significantly uplift smallholder farmers if financial institutions step in to provide funding,” he said.
Oluwatosin Ojo, a partner at Sahel Capital, noted that farmers struggle to access finance because stakeholders in the value chain operate in silos rather than as an interconnected system.
“We need to first understand that agriculture is a system. It should not be seen as a unit. We cannot keep solving our food challenges in silos. We need a system that works, one that is a multidimensional connectivity of all the processes in the value chain.”
She reckoned that investors expect profit on their investments, which is why they sometimes refuse financing to individual farmers, knowing of the risks such as climate change, flooding, and poor seedlings.
“The value chain is broken. We need to find the linkages where everything we do is intertwined. If we don’t do this, finance will be lost,” Ojo noted.
The difficulty with mechanised farming
But mechanisation remains a major constraint to food production. Godson Ohuruogu, chief executive officer of TracTrac Mechanisation Services Limited, pointed out that Nigeria’s agriculture sector is limited by a lack of access to tractors, poor policies, and insufficient capacity among farmers to handle mechanised equipment.
“Nigeria has a tractor challenge that is limiting our food production, and this is a big problem,” he said.
He recalled that in 2010, the United States had approximately 4.2 million tractors, whereas Nigeria in 2025 still lacks adequate tractor availability.
“A 200-horsepower tractor is too expensive for smallholder farmers, yet hiring one is cheaper than manual labour. The problem is, they are simply not available.”
He also argued that land fragmentation increases operational inefficiencies, making mechanised farming difficult.
He called for government-backed incentives for local tractor fabrication and a structured approach to scaling farmers from smallholder operations into commercial ventures.
Climate change and infrastructure deficits further compound Nigeria’s food security concerns. John Alamu, group managing director of Johnvents Industries, pointed to the surge in global cocoa prices, now at $2,000 per tonne, due to erratic weather patterns disrupting production.
While higher prices may benefit farmers in the short term, he warned that rising chocolate costs signal deeper issues of supply instability. “In developed markets, AI predicts planting cycles while drones handle precision spraying,” he said. “Meanwhile, Nigeria still debates how to provide basic farm inputs”
“It’s easier to be an Instagram CEO than a farmer”
Alamu also raised concerns over the country’s youth involvement in agriculture. “It’s easier to be an Instagram CEO than a farmer,” he remarked. “Over 60 percent of Nigerians are young and not doing agriculture. People could do cocoa processing. If the youth are more involved, there will be more innovation that will help us address climate issues.”
Kabir Ibrahim, national president of the All Farmers Association of Nigeria (AFAN), warned that food insecurity cannot be tackled without addressing Nigeria’s weak infrastructure.
“We cannot talk about food systems without power, transportation, and security. These are the backbone of agricultural productivity,” he said.
He proposed an immediate government-backed initiative to support up to 100 farmers across small, medium, and large scales to optimise production. In the long term, he emphasised the need for investments in rural roads and logistics to ensure efficient food distribution.
