CPPE laments, says Tinubu’s committee on food security yet to impact prices

Following the soaring prices of food items in the market, the Centre for the Promotion of Private Enterprise (CPPE) has lamented that the President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s committee on food security has yet to bear any impact on rising prices of food in the country.

Muda Yusuf, the Director of CPPE, made this known in a recent statement reacting to Nigeria’s latest headline and food inflation in May 2024, which stood at 33.95 percent and 40.66 per cent, respectively.

Earlier, President Tinubu had set up a committee to address Nigeria’s food security challenges.

Few months after the establishment of the committee, CPPE lamented that the purchasing power of Nigerians had continued to drop amid the untamed inflationary pressure.

READ ALSO:FG injected ₦309bn into agriculture in one year to boost food security —Minister

According to the economic think-tank group, drivers of Nigeria’s inflation include the depreciating exchange rate, surging transportation costs, logistics and supply chain challenges, forex market volatility, energy costs, climate change, insecurity in farming communities, seasonality of agricultural outputs, and structural bottlenecks to production.

“Regrettably, inflation drivers are not receding. There is also the factor of seasonality of agricultural outputs, which triggers seasonal price surges in some food crops. It is important to stress that insecurity in farming communities remains a major factor in disrupting agricultural production and perpetuating the food supply crisis.

“The food security situation is frightening and requires an urgent and emergency response. Meanwhile, the impact of the Presidential Committee on Food Security is yet to be felt. We believe that the proposals contained in the government’s Inflation Reduction and Price Stability Plan will have a significant impact in moderating inflationary pressures if implemented. We request that the plan be urgently implemented.

“The government could review the tariff policies by granting concessionary import duty on intermediate products for industrialists. The same is true for investors in the logistics sector. Some of these measures are already contained in the draft Accelerated Economic and Sustainability Plan proposed by the Coordinating Minister of the Economy,” he stated.

By: Babajide Okeowo

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