Discussing The Challenges of Pesticides in Nigeria & Agroecology As An Alternative

Discussing the Challenges
of Pesticides in Nigeria &

Agroecology as an
Alternative in
2023 Budget
Donald Ikenna Ofoegbu
Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung - The green political foundation www.ng.boell.org

Outline
• Food, Pesticide and Pesticide Categories
• Pesticide Hazard in Nigeria: Reported Cases
• Pesticide Use in Nigeria and Implication
• Pesticide Entry Channels in Nigeria
• The Alternatives: Agroecology, Organic Farming,
Biopesticides, IPM, Climate Agric
• Budgeting for the Alternatives: Commitment so far from
2019-2022
• Recommendations

Introduction: Food and Pesticide
Food Sustains Life and Food Produces Wealth.

Food fails to be food when it no longer sustains Life –
it’s Poison.
• In order to provide plentiful SAFE food supply, conventional and organic farmers
have multiple options to protect crops from weeds and pests—including pesticides.
• What is a pesticide? A pesticide is any substance or mixture of substances natural,
organic or man-made, used to prevent, destroy or manage pests.
• Different types of pesticides target different types of pests. For example, insecticides
target insects, herbicides target weeds, and fungicides target fungi that may cause
plant diseases.
• Pesticides can also be synthetic/chemical pesticides or bio/organic pesticides.

Intro: Food and Pesticide
• Chemical Pesticides are an important tool used mostly in commercial monoculture agriculture to
control insects, weeds and diseases and maintain crop yield by minimizing losses. However,
chemical pesticides have many harmful human and environmental impacts on non-target
species, the food system, and the entire ecosystem functions – affecting climate change.
• Chemical pesticides may be suitable for plants for a while, at first, yields will start to increase a lot,
and then decline, as the pesticides end up killing the necessary microorganisms that plants/crops,
need to grow. Soils get poorer in the medium and long team; becoming less and less productive –
thus forcing farmers to rely on improved seeds, GMO, chemical fertilizers and more pesticides.
• On humans, the number of pesticide poisonings is increasing dramatically worldwide. The World
Health Organization estimates that 385 million farmers fell victim to acute poisoning in
2019 most of them in Asia and Africa. Of the total of 860 million farmers worldwide, almost half
are poisoned each year.
• Although developing countries like Nigeria, use only 25% of chemical pesticides produced
worldwide, they experience 99% of pesticide deaths. The message of pesticide safety in such
countries is a myth/fable.
Pesticide Categorization
It is evidence that most Small holder farmers in

developing countries use large amounts of pesticides
belonging to classes Ia, Ib, and II.

Nigeria’s Agriculture: Bitter Harvest
Many farmers do not use any

personal protection equipment
(PPE), such as face masks,
gloves, boots and eye
protection.
Many cannot afford PPE or it

is not available.
No Recent Data on the Amount of Pesticide Used in Nigeria. Check the FAO website that provides such information for several countries.
Est. 1998, about 125,000-130,000 metric tons of pesticides applied every year in Nigeria. www.ng.boell.org
Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung - The green political foundation
• Diarrhea is 2nd Biggest killer of children in Nigeria.
• An estimated 151,700 children die in Nigeria every
year from diarrhea disease. 16% of child's death in
Nigeria every year.
• Cancer is responsible for 72,000 deaths in Nigeria
every year, with an estimated 102,000 new cases of
cancer annually. - National Cancer Control Plan (2018–2022),
• Nigeria has one of the highest cancer mortality
rates in the world. With approximately 4 out of 5
cases resulting in death. - Global Cancer Observatory.
Loss Of Foreign Revenue from Food Exports
• Over 76% of Nigeria’s agricultural commodities

rejected by EU — NAFDAC
• Nigeria loses N617bn export revenue to toxins in
food - Business Day 2022
• Over the last 5-7 years, Nigeria’s food export to the
EU and America have continuously been rejected
and banned due to the high pesticide residues of
HHPs.
• Since 2015, Nigeria’s food export of beans, sesame
seeds, melon seeds, dried fish and meat, peanut
chips and palm oil have been banned from entering
Europe and the USA because they exceeded the
maximum residual limit (MRL) for pesticides (mostly
of the ones banned in Europe).
Pesticide Entry Channels in Nigeria

Budgeting for Sustainable, Climate Resilient Agriculture, Agroecology and Smallholder
Women Farmers in Nigeria (At Federal and State Level) in Previous Years: 2015 – 2019.

RECOMMENDATION
• FGN and ECOWAS should take a strong stand against the pesticide double standards in pesticide trade by international
communities – multinational agro-manufacturing companies and their home country government. FMARD should begin to
develop pesticide policies and legislation that ensure that the most toxic pesticides are prohibited, and phased out in Nigeria,
and a significant shift made towards sustainable farm systems like climate-smart agriculture and agroecology.
• The government needs to develop safe sustainable food strategies that reduce the use of highly toxic synthetic chemical
pesticides by 50% by 2030; 25% by 2040, a maximum of 5% by 2050 and strong support to be given to farmers in their
transition towards agroecology.
• FMARD, CBN and NIRSAL need to engage and educate farmers and farmer groups, listed vendors, manufacturers and importers
of agrochemicals about the negative impact of Highly Hazardous Pesticides (HHPs) on Nigeria’s public health, environment and
foreign revenue.
• Farmers’ associations and agro-dealers should also put measures in place for self-regulation on pesticide use and trade in the
country to ensure that highly hazardous pesticides and does banned locally and internationally are not used, promoted or sold
in Nigeria.
• FMARD, CBN, Bank of Agriculture (BOA), Bank of Industry (BOI) and FMARD should mandate agrochemical dealers in their
anchor-borrower programmes to remove all HHPs from their programmes and encourage them to supply more organic inputs
such as Biopesticides, organic fertilizers etc.
• FMARD and State ministries of agriculture should increase budget allocation for organic inputs, bio-pesticides, climate-smart
agriculture and agroecology.
• To ensure the successful implementation of agroecological projects, the federal and states government need to be deliberate
in collaborating with organisations and institutions that have proven record of successful agroecological farms across Nigeria.
This will build the capacity of the relevant MDAs and stakeholders in the area of agroecology and afforestation.
Thank You

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Discussing the Challenges

of Pesticides in Nigeria &

Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung - The green political foundation www.ng.boell.org

Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung - The green political foundation www.ng.boell.org

Food Sustains Life and Food Produces Wealth.

Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung - The green political foundation www.ng.boell.org

It is evidence that most Small holder farmers in

Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung - The green political foundation www.ng.boell.org

Many farmers do not use any

Many cannot afford PPE or it

• Over 76% of Nigeria’s agricultural commodities

Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung - The green political foundation www.ng.boell.org

Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung - The green political foundation www.ng.boell.org

Heinrich-Böll-Stiftung - The green political foundation www.ng.boell.org

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