Aljazirahnews has gathered that the specie of rice being imported to Nigeria from Thailand is not consumed by citizens in the same exporting country.

Aljazirahnews reports that Nigeria ranks among the world largest importers of rice, and it feeds a larger part of its population with the imported varieties.

The Thailand parboiled rice breed often exported to Nigeria is a long-grain rice which has the capability to double its original size irrespective of the quantity of water added.

This has made it a first choice amongst Nigerian housewives who view it as cost saving in the economic downturn.

A former Nigerian Ambassador to Thailand, Ambassador Chudi Okafor in an interview with Aljazirahnews said Thailand is one of the largest rice producing countries that have made headway in agriculture through the adoption of Genetically Modified seedlings.

According to him the rice exporting nation often exported packaged parboiled rice to improve the shelf life of the agricultural produce.

Aljazirahnews learnt further that although, not a stable food for the Thai people, this parboiled rice has been actively produced in Thailand for export to other countries (including Nigeria) all over the world.

The Ambassador said: “One thing I said is why we need to go back to the drawing board is that we were relying on these seeds that we had since independence that’s why we need to go back to the seedlings themselves that’s why Thailand has succeeded in what they are doing.

“So if we say Thailand is number one in rice production, how did they manage? They have over 12 varieties of rice and what they actually send to us here, they don’t eat themselves.

He adds that “Rice is like festival for them and they have varieties of rice. From rice they have cosmetics, cornflakes. They have all sort of things that you can’t believe, medicals and these are marketed globally now. Why? because of research and development, cross breeding. They don’t just say because of these rice is in different colours- white colour, brown colour etc- the ones they eat, that they won’t give to us. We remain the largest importer of rice in the world.”

He called for an intensive research and development in the agriculture sector, especially in rice to meet local rice demands.

He cited instances of plants grown without soils in the Asian countries, attributing it to research and innovations.

“We have so much seeds in every state in every local government. Since we grew up, no effort has been put in place so we need to embrace these seedlings and get it right from the beginning.

“If you say Genetically Modified food or crop and so on, okay take Thailand for instance, when I asked further on their agriculture, they told me about cabbage. See their cabbage and other vegetables are grown without soil.

“So tell me, how do you think we can feed over 20 million tourists in a year with growing cabbage on the soil, they are just on top of something like pond water. Ponds that are in an enclosure. We have a lot to learn but for me that’s why I am talking about semi mechanised farming.

“You don’t go into trying to solve a problem and you create another one. You have a lot of graduates walking about without jobs so don’t go into full mechanisation otherwise you defeat the purpose because it means that only few people can master this thing and people will still be walking the street.

He noted that the nation had a lot to learn from other industrialised nations to move ahead economically.

“So at this stage, we will be talking of semi mechanised. This is knowledge economy age. We are now in the ICT age, in fact Asia has moved beyond Thailand and Malaysia. They are not talking of patent, they are not talking of copyright but the stage we are now if we want Africa to be the next focus of growth, which we nearly got right few years, we need to go further. So that’s why we need to focus into that aspect. We need to focus on the right thing so that we must conquer food insecurity. It is not a joke.”

http://aljazirahnews.com/index.php/2016/10/28/thailand-rice-ignored-home-consumed-nigeria/

Really Oga oooo

other countries are exporting agricultural produce but here all we do is consume and comsume more like rats!!! I support the ban on imported rice....we must learn to produce what we eat for goodness sakes

symbianDON:
other countries are exporting agricultural produce but here all we do is consume and comsume more like rats!!! I support the ban on imported rice....we must learn to produce what we eat for goodness sakes

you are on point