The Nation (Nigeria), in a report about forecasts of severe food shortages due to shocks on food systems, writes that several multi-stakeholder dialogues have been convened to facilitate the sharing of good practices, innovations, and advocate actions to ensure smallholder farmers have access to fertilizer to safeguard their food and nutrition security.
"The International Food Policy Research Institute (IFPRI) noted that fertilizer use in Nigeria, Kenya, and other parts of Sub-Saharan Africa was still below 50kg per hectare, compared to Asian countries such as Malaysia where consumption averages 1,570kg per hectare, Hong Kong 1,297kg per hectare and Bangladesh at 278 kg per hectare.
Consequently, IFPRI has thrown its weight behind meetings across Africa held to discuss how to address issues impacting growth of fertiliser use, including poor-quality control, weak agro-dealer networks, lack of initiatives to provide financial services to importers and agro-dealers, poor port, rail and road infrastructure and unsustainable, poorly planned and coordinated subsidy programmes."
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