BREAKING: Tinubu approves release of 42,000 metric tonnes of grains

By Kunle Sanni

President Bola Tinubu on Thursday approved the immediate release of 42,000 metric tonnes of grains from the national reserve.

The minister of information Mohammed Idris said this on Thursday while briefing State House correspondents after the conclusion of a meeting with the Presidential committee on food intervention.

The meeting was chaired by the President’s Chief of Staff, Mr. Femi Gbajabiamila.

Speaking on the essence of the meeting, Idris said President Tinubu’s directive is part of measures to cushion the current hardship of food shortage in the country.

He revealed that the distribution would be done in collaboration with the Ministry of Agriculture and the rice Millers Association of Nigeria.

According to him, “Today’s meeting was again on the issue of difficulty, like I said two days ago, of putting food on the table of most Nigerians, and has come up with some measures to ensure that food becomes more readily available to Nigerians.

“The first one is that the Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security have been directed to release about 42,000 metric tons of maize, millet, Garri, and other commodities in their strategic reserve so that these items will be made available to Nigerians.

“The second one is that we have held meetings with the rice Millers Association of Nigeria, those who are responsible for producing this rice and we have asked them to open up their stores.

“They’ve told us that they can guarantee about 60,000 metric tons of rice. This will be made available and we know that that is enough to take Nigerians for the next one month to six weeks, perhaps up to two months 60,000 metric tons. They’ve agreed that they will make that available to Nigerians to bring it out to the market so that food is made available.”

He said the whole idea of this is to crash the cost of these food items.

“And these are measures that will happen immediately,” he said.