Flood devastates rice farms

Rice farmers in Nasarawa state are counting their losses after flood,  occasioned by heavy rainfall and water released from dams destroyed  their crops. Farmlands in the areas located close to River Benue and other adjoining areas like Tunga, Ogah, Janqua areas of Nasarawa state, suffered  severe damage. High volume of water submerged thousands of hectares […]

Rice farmers in Nasarawa state are counting their losses after flood,  occasioned by heavy rainfall and water released from dams destroyed  their crops.
Farmlands in the areas located close to River Benue and other adjoining areas like Tunga, Ogah, Janqua areas of Nasarawa state, suffered  severe damage.
High volume of water submerged thousands of hectares of farmlands in the villages as farmers lament total destruction of their rice farms.
Mr. Rotimi Williams is one of the farmers whose 1,000-hectare cultivated  rice farm in Tunga was completely destroyed a week after water released  from one of the dams destroyed 40% of the land.
The 34-year-old young Nigerian commercial farmer expressed sadness over government policy towards rice production, adding that “government gives more attention to rice processors instead of rice farmers who are the  rice producers.”
“If this continues, I do not see any prospect of attaining  self-sufficiency in rice production. You know when flood destroys  farmlands; it is the farmers that suffer because processors do not  suffer from flood effect. So, help and attention should be directed to  farmers,” he said.
Other farmers spoken to in Tunga said they woke up Sunday to discover  that high volume of water as deep as 9ft submerged their farms.
Farms in adjoining villages of Ogah and Janqua have also been severely destroyed by the floods.
Abimiku Jatua, a residence of Lafia, who has four hectares of rice farm in  ogah, told the reporter that everything he worked for this year as far as  rice is concerned is gone.
“For this year, it is over for me. Nothing else is left there,” he  lamented.