Central Bank governor, Godwin Emefiele has said that the apex bank plans to fall back on its strategic grains reserve as part of efforts to check food inflation.
Emefiele who made this known while speaking to newsmen in Abuja said that the idea is to moderate food prices that could be occasioned by recent flooding across the country.
Data from the National Bureau of Statistics shows that food inflation rose to 23.72 per cent in October 2022, 5.39 per cent higher than the rate recorded in October 2021 (18.34 per cent).
According to the bureau, the rise in food inflation was caused by high prices of bread and cereals, food products, potatoes, yams and other tubers, oil and fat.
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Emefiele said that the flooding of this year happens to be the worst in the last five years in Nigeria, which has affected 32 out of the 36 states of the country.
“This meant that farmers lost their crops, prices of food and other agricultural produce will go up,” he said. “From our side at the CBN and the federal government, we have our strategic reserve, particularly for rice and for grains like maize, which we will use to moderate prices.”
He noted that the apex bank had been maintaining the strategic reserve for the past three years and that it had been yielding results. He added that the CBN would also support dry-season farming to further check food inflation.
“Since the flooding is beginning to recede, we will aggressively go into the dry season programme,” he said. “This will make sure that the impact of the rising food prices does not linger for too long so that we can have control of prices of agricultural produce and other consumer goods.”
Story was adapted from the Cable.
