After the country was embarrassed by the food and drug agencies of other countries, the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) addressed the media some weeks ago, urging Nigerians to stop embarrassing the country when exporting farm produce and processed food. This is more reactive than proactive, and it has raised many questions among Nigerians.

In a place like Lagos, various radio stations grant interviews to organisers of seminars who claim to teach people how to export various food items to other countries. Does this mean that any NAFDAC officer has never heard about these programmes, or that the Public Relations unit of the agency does not monitor the media in Pan-Nigeria?

I do not doubt the availability of NAFDAC’s standard and international laboratories, but I doubt their effectiveness. Even locally, especially herbal drugs that have passed through these said laboratories cannot be totally sacrosanct. Also, many bottled waters have been certified by the organisation, yet they are not fit for human consumption.

In my search for information on how farm produce is certified before export, I found that there is no standard testing method. Product requirements and specifications vary by country. I would like to know whether NAFDAC has a catalogue of the specifications for all destinations to which these products are exported worldwide.

Equally, the NAFDAC approval granted to edibles like Knorr, a food seasoning, and products of the Nigerian Bottling Company is not accepted overseas. As such, international accreditation obtained locally does not guarantee external certification by other agencies. People would not take NAFDAC’s claims seriously because of these experiences.

How free is any transaction with a government official in Nigeria? This is a very cogent question that needs to be answered by those working in Government ministries and agencies. The Federal Road Safety Corps (FRSC) reiterates that a driving license costs N6,500, but I have yet to see anyone who paid that rate. The cheapest I have heard from people is N15,000 without a receipt. The culture of kickback, kick-forward and kick-in-between while trying to get the produce certified in the civil service way would either kill the entrepreneur or make him lose business.

Before the era of the late Professor Dora Akunyili, NAFDAC was a toothless bulldog in Nigeria. During the days of Professor Akunyili’s Midas touch, those who manufactured drugs sat up, and Nigeria was better for it. NAFDAC was everywhere, from the dailies to the electronic media. They were either confiscating, destroying or sensitising Nigerians about a particular product that should not be consumed. We have returned to the dark days when Nigerians were guinea pigs for testing fake and unhealthy products.

The Ministry of Agriculture cannot be exempted from all the issues. Many farm settlements have died either a natural or artificial death because the extension workers are not supportive enough; many improved seedlings have been ceded to the family of the extension workers. In fact, the fertiliser shown on television as purchased by the state government has been given to their associates, who have the wherewithal to manage their farms.

Also, there is no education about the use of pesticides. Farmers do not know how to apply pesticides; they apply these chemicals intuitively. As such, by the time the crops are harvested, they are unfit for human consumption and exportation.

There are professionals in Agricultural Engineering. These are the corps of people that should help with advanced farm tools and implements that would change the crude ways of preserving farm products and other commodities that need to be exported. If, truly, the process used in producing dried fish and meat is not healthy, then the onus lies on them to manufacture equipment that will help us, as Nigerians, be healthy. Moreover, there are even ways to improve our traditional ways of life.

The Nigerian Export Promotion Council (NEPC) needs to double its efforts to ensure that Nigeria remains a country capable of exporting farm produce and other processed foods to other countries. The agency can help in working closely with other multilateral institutions to develop homegrown solutions before making them available for export.

The Nigerian project is in progress, and a lot of synergy is needed across agencies, ministries, and the private sector. We need to develop a structure wherein all loopholes are blocked. There should be laboratories in all the Ministries that deal with human life. In Nigeria and other countries, human lives are the fulcrum of development. We cannot continue to trivialise good health for the sake of profiteering. We all need to work together to make our country great, without being limited in the volume of exports to other nations around the world.

Olutayo IRANTIOLA is a PR Specialist, Atọ́kùn, Yorùbá Lákọ̀tun, Book Reviewer, Creative Writer, Cultural Advocate, Poet, Citizen Journalist