Nigeria must address the root causes of insecurity to enhance food production and restore stability, according to Akinwumi Adesina, President of the African Development Bank.
In an exclusive interview aired on Channels Television’s Sunrise Daily on Thursday, Adesina highlighted the urgent need for structural reforms. He stressed that creating jobs and economic opportunities in rural areas is essential to counter the insecurity threatening the nation’s agricultural future.
Adesina, a former Minister of Agriculture, pointed to the launch of the $538 million first phase of the Special Agro-Industrial Processing Zones (SAPZs) in Kaduna on Tuesday as a significant step forward. He explained that the initiative aims to address the insecurity stalling food production by unlocking local production potential and strengthening Agro-Industrial value chains nationwide.
The SAPZs are expected to generate thousands of jobs, particularly in rural areas where poverty and insecurity are most acute. “When you have all of these zones, you will be creating a massive number of jobs, because a lot of people who went into the criminal economy are jobless,” Adesina said. “If people don’t have jobs and then they turn the criminal economy into jobs, that’s not the economy that you want.”
Adesina emphasised that tackling high levels of poverty and youth unemployment in rural communities is critical to resolving insecurity.
“Unless and until you deal with this issue of high poverty structurally, and the high level of unemployment among young people, many of them in rural areas—we are not going to get out of that,” he said.
He added that the SAPZs would provide real economic opportunities for farmers and Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs), bringing hope and stability back to rural Nigeria.
