Abuja – The House of Representatives yesterday urged the Federal Government to give more attention to rural development by increasing the annual budget of the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development to accommodate the increasing needs of the rural populace.
This call which became necessary due to poor allocation of funds to the Ministry of Agriculture, had irked Hon. Oladipupo O. Adebutu who moved the motion on the floor of the House so as to address the anomalies.
He opined that the 2013 budget which was about N39.5bn was budgeted for capital projects and only about N2.8bn of this amount was provided through the Millennium Development Goals(MDGs) to fund the Ministry.
This according to him represented about 5.5 percent of the entire Ministry ‘s budget for the year, and was allocated to the rural development ;and the 2014 and 2015 budgets were not much different from those of the previous years.
Aware that all over the world, the main sectors that drive the development of any nation are the Agricultural, Industrial, Communications, Educational and other allied sectors, Hon. Adebutu told his colleagues that many countries have dedicated a specific Ministry to rural development to adequately cater for the needs of the rural areas.
“In 2012, out of N36bn budgeted for capital projects by the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, only about N3.5bn, which was provided through the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) funding and representing about 4 percent of the entire Ministry ‘s budget for that year, was allocated to rural development.”
” These Paltry percentages allocated for rural development cannot achieve the purpose and to compound the situation, the funds hitherto obtained from the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) projects have ceased with the winding down of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) projects funding in 2015.”
When the motion was open for debate by Rt. Hon.Yakubu Dogara who presided over the plenary session , majority of the lawmakers spoke in favour of the motion and equally voted in support of the motion when it was put to vote
Rt. Hon. Dogara later mandated the Committee on Rural Development to investigate the state of rural developmental projects nationwide and the specific programme geared towards rural development and report back to the House within four weeks for further legislative inputs.
Meanwhile House is on recess for one week to enable various Committees to conclude their debate on budget defence.
