(PMNewsNigeria.com) The Nigeria Cassava Growers Association (NCGA) says the country can save over N800 billion foreign exchange, hitherto used for ethanol importation, by exploiting the potential of cassava.
Pastor Segun Adewumi, the National President of the NCGA, said this in an interview with News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja on Tuesday.
He said that although ethanol was currently produced locally, 97 per cent of the commodity in the country was still imported.
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“When we planted cassava for the cassava bread initiative, our produce were not purchased because the processors, who were supposed to buy from us, did not have access to funds; so they could not buy from us and our cassava rotted away.
“Farmers, therefore, became discouraged from plantin. Lately, farmers could not go to their farms because of fear of the menacing herdsmen.
“These are the factors that reduced the volume of cassava in circulation last year,’’ he said.
Besides, Adewumi said that the current increase in foreign exchange rate of the naira against the dollar had contributed to its scarcity.
He said that many importers of ethanol, who could not afford the high foreign exchange for their imports, resorted to local production of ethanol using the crop. READ MORE
Nigeria: Nation Can Make Billions From Cassava Export – Expert (The Guardian)