In this interview, Baba Othman Ngelzarma, the national president of the Miyetti Allah Cattle Breeders Association of Nigeria (MACBAN), explains major factors responsible for the dwindling cattle trade between the North and South and what needs to be done to address some of the lingering problems of the subsector to make it contribute more to the country’s gross domestic product and create jobs.
Having worked in this sector for years, what do you think are the factors responsible for the decline in cattle trade, especially between the North and the southern part of Nigeria?
The first is the insecurity associated with the business. You know that cattle ownership belongs mostly to pastoralists who are practising an outdated system of animal husbandry, living in vulnerable areas. As a result of this, they become seriously affected by the insecurity in the country, which has lingered for decades. Secondly, there are issues of cattle rustling. We are talking about over four million cattle getting lost as a result of rustling. You can imagine the extent this can affect a business. Apart from cattle rustling, there is the issue of kidnapping. So, the pastoralists remain at the receiving end; most of them are kidnapped in the forest on a daily basis.
This has also contributed immensely to the decline in the business. Then there is banditry. Hardly can you hear of bandits attacking a community without carting away cattle. Sometimes the bandits would come to a particular community, take away all the cattle belonging to different pastoralist families and get away with them.
Another factor is the issue of poor system of transportation – the way the transportation of cattle is handled is also affecting the business. Most of the cattle that leave for the southern part of the country, where they are mostly consumed, are transported by trucks. So, the high cost of diesel or fuel, along with multiple taxes on the road, is a problem. Today, if a truck loads cattle from Maiduguri to Lagos, the owners must pay not less than N200,000 on the road to illegal tax collectors from state to state that mount roadblocks to collect money unnecessarily from the owners of these cattle.
This multiple taxation is also adding up to the issue. Again, the way they are transported, some of the cows die in transit because they will have to spend two to three days without either water or grass to eat before arriving at their destination.
Recession in the economy also contributes: All small and middle-class businesses have gone down the drain because of inflation in the economy, and the dwindling naira value against the US dollars, which is also affecting cattle business.
There are reports that insecurity has forced some of the herders to relocate abroad. Is this true?
Yes. About 15 per cent of them have migrated out of the country. Some are going to Ghana, Benin Republic, Cameroon, up to Central Africa looking for places they could find peace for their survival and that of their only source of livelihood – the cattle. These are some of the things affecting the business.
What role do you think state governments in the North can play to stabilise whatever challenges these herders are facing?
Well, we almost lost hope on how the government can come into this issue, but with the creation of the new livestock development ministry, at least we are becoming more hopeful. We now have a dedicated ministry with the responsibility to look at how to develop the entire livestock subsector. And we know that with the potential the subsector has in the economy, if it is turned around positively, it would also stimulate the economy in a way that more foreign exchange would be earned into the country from the export of cattle and related products like milk and the other value chain. The country would have been saved from spending unnecessary money from the importation of products like milk.
The coming of the new ministry is the only hope we have to transform the entire livestock production system in the country. We are also happy that some of the state governors are following suit to create a similar ministry in their states so that they can be on the same page with the federal government.
Are you comfortable with how the governors, particularly those from the North, approach this issue?
Some have done their best, but if you look at the whole of the livestock subsector in Nigeria, you would realise that it has been neglected for decades. Up till now, I can’t see one plan on ground to solve the settlement of livestock owners in the country. Even those states that have access to the federal government intervention fund under the National Livestock Transformation Plan went and developed some grazing reserves, providing houses. But the pastoralists we have in the country don’t require houses immediately. What they require is pasture and water for the animals. If pasture and water can be provided in a particular area, don’t even bother about giving them houses. Leave them to stay in those local hamlets because they are used to them. That is their tradition and they are comfortable with it. What they are concerned with is pasture and water. And after all, what is driving them down to the South, into the hinterland, is search of pasture and water, nothing more. Wherever pasture and water can be provided, you will see them in their large numbers there. Until we get them to stay in one place in their large numbers, that is when you would have the opportunity to begin to sensitise them and show them that today we have a cow that is weighing 1,000 kilogrammes in the world, against the one they have that is weighing not more than 160. You can also show them that a cow can give up to 50 litres of milk per cow per day against how others give a maximum of not more than 5 litres. They don’t know it. These are some of the things we believe can be done to address the issue.
What are some of the pressing concerns you would like to see the newly established ministry address immediately?
Nothing will work without improved security. If I may advise the minister, let him first and foremost direct his attention towards evolving some sort of non-kinetic approach towards solving the security issues related to livestock production in the country. This is because livestock producers in Nigeria are in the centre of every crisis. It is a coincidence that 95 per cent of cattle ownership in the country belongs to the Fulani, who are the major pastoralists. And you know they are practising an outdated system of animal husbandry – roaming the wild, looking for food and fodder; and as a result of this, so many things come up.
Also, there issues of the blockage of cattle roads they used to patronise to link the grazing reserves. And because of the growing population, that will continue to increase, causing enormous demand on the land that doesn’t increase. A lot of farm destruction comes up and it is no longer handled in the most reasonable way; rather, in some areas, it is given the colouration of either an ethnic or religious crisis. In some areas, insecurity of cattle is also added to it. Then kidnapping comes in.
There is also the issue of negative profiling of pastoralists by some media outlets, which has helped to further aggravate hatred between not only farmers but communities and the Fulani, who are mostly the pastoralists.
Because of this, what we advise the minister is to direct his attention first and foremost towards bringing security into the business. He should come up with a non-kinetic approach to complement the kinetic approach used done.
Secondly, the entire subsector lacks data, which is very essential for policy-making. So, while enhanced security approach is going on, issues of data generation should also come up. The last time a livestock census was conducted in the country was in 1991. Since then, we are going by those statistics. There is no comprehensive data on livestock population, let alone owners. It is important for us to know the population of livestock owners, alongside their livestock because it is very necessary for security purposes. A particular state can only function towards solving security issues if it knows the number of pastoralists in its local government areas and communities. It will be easier to identify them and know them so that we can fish out the bad ones from the good ones. Therefore, data is very essential.
Also, we have a lot of cattle markets spread across the country, but we don’t have their data. We have a lot of pastoralists spread across the country and we don’t know their data. We don’t know what area is more populated than others. These are things that are very essential for policymaking and security. They are very essential for every sort of development.
He should try to evolve a settlement model that considers the peculiarity of the pastoralists in order to begin to settle them, not the normal model that has been imported from other countries; it won’t work in this country. Our experts will have to put their heads together and evolve a model of settlement that considers the peculiarities.
But with the coming of the ministry, and the minister, who is a practising livestock farmer for decades, we believe he knows some, if not all the peculiarities. We believe that now that the ministry is here and the right person to direct it is also there, things will change for good. We have a lot of confidence in him.