FG to shut land borders if...

Impounded bags of rice.

The Federal Government has threatened to shut some land borders if the smuggling of rice continues from neighbouring countries. Chief Audu Ogbeh, the Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, gave the warning on Monday while speaking to newsmen on some of the Federal Government’s achievements in the agriculture sector in the last two years in Abuja.

Ogbeh said the decision had become necessary to encourage local rice farmers and to enable the country achieve self sufficiency in rice by 2018.

“We believe they are determined to sabotage the efforts that we are making to guarantee self sufficiency in rice and to save foreign exchange which we don’t have.