Benue cassava farmers lament sudden market collapse

Cassava farmers in Benue State are currently facing a harsh reality: market prices have crashed, putting their massive investment at risk since the beginning of this year.

Some of the farmers who spoke to our correspondent in Makurdi lamented that it had never been this bad – they had planted in anticipation of solving their financial problems, but the drastic price drop has dashed their dreams.

“We planted hope but harvested loss,” one of the worried cassava farmers, Maryann Anyebe said.

Anyebe explained that her dream of sending her son to a higher institution of learning earlier this year remained on hold as her cassava harvest amounted to minimal returns following the price crash.

She said the local processors themselves slashed buying rates to the extent that it became difficult for farmers to know what exactly to do with their harvested cassava.

“As we speak, the cassava market is in turmoil. Farmers like me are counting losses following the sudden market collapse. It started like joke in January this year when a tricycle (Keke) load of harvested cassava dropped from N120,000 to N80,000. It continued the sharp fall by April, and in November, farmers had to beg processors to take their harvest at N40,000 or N30,000, depending on their bargaining power of bargain,” she explained.

Expectedly, more cassava farmers like Anyebe across the 23 local government areas of the state have continued to struggle as prices plummeted and processors are no longer willing to pay more, leaving the farmers to count their losses.

Oche Yakubu, another cassava farmer in Benue South senatorial district expressed concern over the collapse of the cassava market, saying the fall has been to the detriment of farmers, especially those who spent a fortune to cultivate their large fields.

“Today, a Keke-load of freshly harvested cassava sold as low as N30,000. How can we make ends meet with that sharp fall in prices? We sprayed the farm with herbicides. We pay labourers for each stage of the farming, and we now face this nightmare?

“Even the processors are no longer buying the cassava because the output (garri) and other value chain price has really gone down, such that in my village market, a basin of garri goes for only N2,000 as against the 32,000 or N40,000 plus it sold by this time last year.

“I am worried that President Bola Ahmed Tinubu is doing farmers more harm than good without considering the reduction of fuel, transport and taxes to balance the equation. We are really suffering because the prices of almost all the crops we cultivate have dropped tremendously, yet the cost of farm inputs, transportation and petrol remains higher than ever,” Yakubu lamented.

Similarly, Favour Elijah, who cultivated cassava in large fields worried that the government had put in a lot of effort to reduce food prices without regulating other products with direct bearing to food production, thereby causing hardship for farmers.

He posited, “The current situation is worrisome to me as a cassava farmer. Processing factories are not the cause of the fall in prices of cassava products, so I can’t blame them. Our government and its regulatory body for price control are to be blamed – they seem to spend all their energy on bringing down the prices of foodstuff in the market, forgetting to bring down prices of other stuff in the market too.

“Cassava farmers like me are not happy with the current situation. Some farmers are quitting already. And as it stands, I don’t know what to do because a huge part of my cassava farm is yet to be harvested. If I sell at the present market prices, I will definitely incur a big loss.  Who wants to work like an elephant and eat like an ant? Nobody!”

For Omakwu Madaki, a commercial farmer in Umogidi village of Adoka district in Otukpo Local Government Area, his farming activities on a 600 expanse of land came to a standstill since the past year following insecurity in his domain, which also hindered him from cultivating cassava this year.

“I didn’t do cassava this year because of insecurity. Even the ones I did the previous year, we haven’t been able to access the location of the farm because it is not safe.

“I farm on an expanse of land, though a family land in the village of about 600 hectares, but it has been abandoned. We lost a whole lot of cassava farm because we couldn’t harvest at the time; they (attackers) brought in their cattle and destroyed everything.

For Terkimbi Ordue, who cultivated cassava at Mbayar, a suburb of Makurdi Local Government Area, the fall in prices has negatively impacted what he described as his bountiful harvest.

“It is too painful for me to sell my cassava at a giveaway price. I even hear that those farmers who take their produce to Ethanol Producing Company along Gboko road are not happy with the slash in prices because they are now allegedly getting less than N1.2 million paid previously for a trailer-load of cassava.

“I sold my cassava product at the local market for buyers who prized it so lowly, but I didn’t have a choice. I am worried because I got almost nothing for all the labour I put into the farm,” Ordue added.

Our correspondent could, however, not confirm from the Chinese-owned cassava processing companies in Makurdi and Ukum local government areas respectively, the claim about slashing their prices for raw cassava brought to the firms by farmers.

But a local cassava processor, Eba Adikwu, said the price slash resulted from the dwindling prices of processed cassava in the value chain, pointing out that one of such products – garri – is now sold at a ridiculous price in the market.

“The price of garri has drastically reduced in the market. In fact, you hardly get buyers these days. The people coming from Port Harcourt and other parts of the country to buy garri in large quantities in Benue no longer do so regularly. Most of them complained that they were unable to sell their products.

“Besides, the prices of rice and other grains have gone down too, so families shifted their food taste. For example, more people now prefer to stuff their houses with grinded maize, millet or guinea corn in place of garri, while others buy rice or yam instead of other cassava products like garri and akpu,”  she noted.

The national vice president of the All Farmers Association of Nigeria (AFAN), Comrade Aondongu Saaku, also told our correspondent that the price of cassava has gone down drastically while the cost of production remains high.

Saaku, who is the immediate past Benue State chairman of the AFAN, blamed the federal government for the plight of the farmers, wondering why the President Tinubu administration ordered the reopening of borders for food to come into the country.

According to him, the way out for the current quagmire is for the federal government to subsidise inputs for farmers so that production cost will not run them down.

In the meantime, cassava farmers in Benue State are at crossroads – not knowing whether to continue farming the tuber crop or quit. Nevertheless, they hope the government’s evolving policy on food production in the country would shape their decision in the near future.

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