The Federal Government of Nigeria said it has identified some challenges and ready to adopt some measures to reduce the price of food items.
Chief Audu Ogbeh, Minister of Agriculture, on Wednesday while addressing State House correspondents at the end of the meeting of the Federal Executive Council, FEC, said the task force set up last week by the federal government in its interim report to the council had identified that the hike in cost is “not due to shortage but high cost of transportation”.
The minister said food items are generally moved across Nigeria with heavy trucks and the price of diesel which has gone up has therefore, led to increase in prices.
He said the government had therefore, decided to “start using railway wagons to transport food items.”
Ogbeh noted that the use of wagons to transport cattle from the north to Lagos has already greatly helped in reducing cost and will be replicated in food distribution.
“We will also work with state governments to reduce delays experienced by trucks along the roads through all sort of taxes by local governments,” he said.
Ogbeh also said the government has decided to adopt the “Ivory Coast model” in which trucks distributing food items are given special labels.
The Federal Executive Council had last week set up a task force to advise the government on how best to address the rising cost of food items across the country.