JUST IN: Rice, maize production to slump 11.5% – AFEX

The Nigerian commodities market player, AFEX has projected an average decline in production of up to 11.5 per cent across commodities like maize, paddy rice, sorghum, and cocoa.

AFEX revealed this on Wednesday during the unveiling of its ‘2022 wet season crop production report’. It, however, forecasted that soybeans and sesame would experience about 6.5 per cent increase in production levels.

The report was released in a hybrid event hosted at the AFEX office in Abuja and it sought to provide accurate reliable data to aid the understanding of the national food system through farmer survey measurement of transaction level.

According to the report, Nigeria’s most consumed grains were currently faced with declining food balance sheets as consumption levels rose than production levels, thereby worsening food insecurity.

The report tracked data from six key commodities and their performance in the preceding season. The commodities are maize, paddy, soybeans, cocoa, sesame and sorghum.

It noted that price and market changes across maize paddy, sorghum, soybean, cocoa and sesame had been affected both by predictable seasonal effects and activities in the agricultural value chain as well as larger macroeconomics and events.

Speaking on the data while presenting the report’s findings, AFEX’s Head of Market Data and Research, David Ibidapo, said that higher prices were forecasted across all commodities in the report.

Specifically, he said maize which faced a projected decline in production levels of up to 14 per cent was subsequently projected to reach a higher average price point ranging between N214.980/MT and N220.000/MT by end of Q4 2022, compared to an average price of N210.229/MT in the fourth quarter of 2021.

He also said soybean price was projected to rise by six per cent by May 2023, and that the projected price hikes across commodities in the report were also tied majorly to incidence of flooding resulting from incessant rainfall in key producing regions.

This, he noted, was expected to heighten the gap between production and output levels by farmers.

He also said the effects of the Russia-Ukraine crisis was still being felt in the local agricultural commodity market especially because of the hike in the price of fertilizer.