Livestock Transformation Plan Fails to Take Off as multiple Factors Ruins it

In the Next Level Agenda, President Muhammadu Buhari guaranteed that Livestock Transformation Plan will create 1.5 million jobs in the agricultural sector. This encompasses the dairy, beef, hide and Skin, blood meal, and crop industries. The Livestock Transformation Plan which was introduced in 2019, is a 10-year plan pointed toward being an alternative to open grazing of cattle so as to forestall destructive conflicts among herders and farmers.

In phase one, the policy document expresses, the NLTP would at first help the development of pilot ranches in each of the seven pilot states of Adamawa, Benue, Kaduna, Nasarawa, Plateau, Taraba and Zamfara.

More states can likewise pitch in with private land arrangements to assist with modelling the achievement of the pilot phase. As a model, the development of four classes of ranches is proposed with size models of 30, 60, 150 and 300 steers respectively, corresponding to small, intermediate, medium and large in every one of the pilot grazing ranches.

In addition, the establishment of one breeder ranch with at least 1000 cattle is proposed for every area in each piloting state. And each piloting state will conclude whether the cluster will be beef or dairy cattle or a mix, contingent upon their idiosyncrasies.

Nonetheless, NLTP is appearing to be a complete failure, the International Crisis Group (ICG) attributes the failure of the plan to get off the ground to “inadequate political leadership, delays, funding uncertainties, lack of expertise and COVID-19.”

A report by the group aptly titled ‘Ending Nigeria’s herder/farmer crisis: The Livestock Reform Plan,’ states that “Nigeria’s latest plan for curbing herder-farmer conflict is facing obstacles, including staff and funding shortages, as well as political opposition. If this initiative fails, there could be more rural violence. Abuja should work with donors to raise both money and awareness of the scheme’s benefits.”

As of now, Nasarawa State, one of the states that entered into the Central Government's NLTP in 2019 has still not begun, Government is yet to set up a ranch in Bauchi. Buhari has very limited time and it is appearing to be that he won’t do much.

Recently, Buhari hasn't taken any major step to fulfil his promise. We rate this promise Stalled.

‍