Governor Godwin Obaseki of Edo State, South-South Nigeria, is appealing to the Federal Government of Nigeria to fund ranches in the state.
Point News reports that Governor Obaseki had urged President Muhammadu Buhari, to make funds available for private business persons to set up cattle ranches in the state.
Obaseki made the appeal on Wednesday when he visited the President at the Presidential Villa in Abuja, FCT.
Obaseki while speaking to State House correspondents after the meeting, noted that while many southern states had ratified the anti-opening grazing law as agreed, Edo State is yet to do so because it wanted to be sure it could enforce the law.
He added that he told the president of the Edo people’s resolve that ranching was a private business.
He said: “Principally, there were four issues I discussed with him. First has to do with the position of Edo State on the anti-grazing law. As you know, most southern states have passed laws relating to open grazing, but Edo has not, because we want to ensure that whatever laws we pass are laws that we can enforce.
“We’ve had extensive consultations with our people, extensive town hall meetings, to deal with the issue that, yes, we do not want open grazing, it is out-modeled, it’s outdated, however, what are the options?
“If we are asking that we should now have ranches and these cattle should now be constrained to specific areas, such as ranches, then who provides the land?
“My people say that, as far as they’re concerned, ranching is a private business and therefore, just like every other agricultural venture, those involved should provide the land.
“As you already know, it is expensive, it is not cheap to run and manage ranches. So, what I came to discuss with the President was that since the people of Edo would rather invest privately, those who are interested want to make it a private concern, then the National Livestock Transformation Programme, which is now being implemented by the federal government, should acknowledge our model, and should also be able to help people benefit from the funding that is now being made available for people who want to go into the livestock business and make investments in ranches and other similar livestock programmes.