THEY prepared borrowed money and materials to invest in efforts at getting a bountiful harvest in the year 2020. Many of them, apparently encouraged by the experience of the past few years, did not want to waste the opportunity offered by the times. But before the end of the first quarter of the year a pandemic, not seen in recent history, happened in the world and sent everybody scampering for cover.


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They meant to feed the nation, but the impact of the pandemic brought untold hardship, making it almost impossible for them to feed their own families.

This is the story of female smallholder farmers in Nigeria who are singing dirges when they are supposed to be dancing to the banks.

The farmers have never had it so bad. From Lagos to Nasarawa; Anambra to Niger State the narrative is total devastation of the efforts meant to assist in realising the goal of food security. The challenge was like a raging flood, with scores swept off their feet, while the government buried its head in the sand. Only a negligible percentage of the over five hundred thousand of the women, members of the Small Scale Women Farmers Organisation, SWOFON, have had a taste of official support. There are those in that little percentage who now wish they had not ventured into plucking the advantage that the government dangled before them.

The consequence is that the poverty they had struggled to put behind them roared back, while the dignity and hope restored have been swept away. For scores of the smallholder women farmers in Nigeria, there is a fresh confrontation with hunger, that old ally they thought had been shaken off.

In the aftermath of the COVID 19 induced lockdown, The ICIR, with the support of the International Budget Partnership, IBP, sent out investigative reporters to seven states of Anambra, Niger, Nasarawa, Jigawa, Lagos, Oyo and the FCT to see how these women farmers were faring.

The reporters, who covered 35 local government areas, were drawn from several newsrooms, including the News Agency of Nigeria, NAN, The Nation, Nigerian Tribune, Plus TV, Daily Trust and Nasarawa Broadcasting Service, NBS. Their briefs were to find out how the farmers fared, during the lockdown occasioned by the spread of the Covid-19 pandemic. They were also to determine whether farmers, particularly the smallholder farmers got financial supports for them to function optimally in the bid to contribute to efforts at ensuring food security in the country. Did they get assistance in the area of provision of modern farming implements or fertilizer and chemicals or insecticides to combat pests? What they came out with are stories of lamentation by the farmers, and fears of food crisis in the aftermath of Covid-19.

The lockdown did a lot of damage to farming business. First, some farmers could not access their farms, particularly those whose farms are located far away from their homes. Not only that, they could not also move farm produce to consumers, as there was restriction of inter-state movement, and where transporters and customers ventured to take advantage of the exemption granted farmers and traders of agricultural products and implements, they could not endure the extortion by security agents deployed to enforce the restriction order by federal and state governments.

Even more damning was the disappearing market. The traditional markets were closed, while institutions and businesses that patronize the farmers were shut down and, therefore, could not purchase the produce even if they were taken there. Hajiya Fatima Dahir Auyo, from Auyo in Jigawa State did not even have the luxury of getting produce to take to any consumer. This is because “We have been thrown into the most difficult and worst situation of the COVID-19 pandemic which stopped us from going to the farm.

It was a good opportunity for the Fulani herdsmen to graze everywhere, including the farmlands.” The plight of the smallholder farmers in Jigawa was summed by the chairperson of SWOFON in the state, Hajiya Hadiza Abdussalam Giwa, “The closure of markets and restriction of movement due to the coronavirus pandemic has made it very difficult for women farmers to source animal feeds and other materials needed for dry season farming”. If anyone thought that was such a terrible experience, then he should listen to Hajiya Hauwa Akamu Rijiya Bakwai, farmers’ coordinator in Birnikudu local government area of the state, “the situation we found ourselves under the lockdown is very worrisome because most of my members have eaten all their capital while sitting at home under lockdown.”

But a more pathetic story is that of Malama Binta Audu Gamasarka, a widow with five children. She had celebrated the change in the economy of the family when the Covid-19 lockdown suddenly reversed the gains she had made after the state government gave her financial support. She said of the change, “After I received an empowerment grant from the Jigawa State government and another agricultural empowerment grant I decided to start using the land we inherited from my husband.

I ventured into rice farming. I have the state government to thank for this change in my family”. For Binta the new song, post lockdown, is a farm that is not doing well, because the lockdown prevented her from taking care of the farm, nor could she get fertiliser for her rice farm. In Nasarawa, women share stories of dryness on the farm, how the lockdown accentuated the scarcity of resources thus making it difficult for farmers to procure fertilisers among other necessary things for the crops to develop well.

Away from Nasarawa, there is a peculiar narrative in neighbouring Niger State where smallholder women farmers are running away from the farm for fear of being kidnapped, killed or raped. Mrs. Mary Hamzanda, the Niger State Coordinator of SWOFON said apart from the challenge of farm tools and chemicals due to lack of resources, the issue of security has posed a serious problem that women had to restrict their movement. She said, “The bandits also rape women and sometimes kill their victims when the ransom is not paid”.

Perhaps in the absence of government assistance to arrest the security situation the women had to stay away from trouble. Hamzanda reasoned that “Instead of you to challenge Fulani herdsmen, you run for your dear life. If you question them, you may be attacked”. Thus, farmers there have to live with the pain of having herdsmen run over their farmland for the purpose of grazing their cattle at the expense of the farmers.

Where the herdsmen are not on rampage , the pandemic drove a knife through the hearts of the farmers. Mrs Funmilayo Olaniran, 50, a smallholder farmer in Igboora, Oyo State said six of them came together and formed a unit of SWOFON in the area. But the pandemic did them a fatal blow. Hear her:

“We plant maize, cassava and melon on five hectares of land, but the effect of COVID-19 has had a negative impact on our business.

READ MORE: https://www.icirnigeria.org/smallholder-women-farmers-still-frustrated-over-promise-of-palliatives-that-remain-a-pipe-dream/