As part of its efforts to boost the country’s export potential and improve stakeholders’ lives through the bean export chain, the Federal Government is pushing for a lifting of the EU’s ban on Nigerian bean exports.
Mrs Iyabode Abe, Trade Promotion Advisor, Ado-Ekiti Assistance Office, Nigerian Export Promotion Council, said the efforts included sensitizing bean farmers and merchants on good agricultural practices and avoiding indiscriminate chemical use.
Abe, speaking at a technical session on value chain export development to address chemical residue in dried bean storage for export in Ado-Ekiti, said the inability to export beans to EU countries had a negative impact on the country’s GDP.
The advisor tasked stakeholders at the event where NEPC distributed hermetic bags for grain storage to bean farmers and merchants with “best practices to actualize the dream of exporting their products to the international market, which will, in turn, increase the GDP of the non-oil sector to Nigeria’s economy.”
Afolabi Bello, NEPC Assistant Director, Products Development Department, stated, “The problem with beans is insects during storage”. People don’t want the weevils because there is a growing demand for them, so farmers and merchants apply chemicals to beans in unlimited quantities to kill the weevils. This has a negative impact on humans who consume the beans.
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“In EU, it was discovered that the pest chemical residue in our beans was too high as at 2015 and consequently suspended Nigeria from exporting beans to the EU until we are able to address these chemical residues from our dry beans”.
According to a recent report from the World Bank, Nigeria and other developing countries are expected to lose between $12bn and $15bn by 2025 to export rejection.
“Beans is part of the commodities affected. So, the earlier we address it, the better. NEPC has been sensitising beans farmers and merchants to the appropriate method of storing beans without the use of chemicals. We have been asking them to embrace other methods of storing beans without application of chemicals, we can use biological methods like pepper, we can use hermetic bags, you can use new speed dust”.
“The use of chemicals for bean preservation has drawn the attention of individuals, government agencies, and organizations to food quality and safety in the country,” said Muyiwa Olumilua, the Ekiti State Commissioner for Trade and Industries, who declared the event open.
