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Govt moves against high cost of foods, to set up task force

Published

9 years ago

February 2, 2017

The Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed, has revealed government’s plan to set up a task force on food security to check the rising cost of the items.

The minister made the disclosure to State House correspondents after a five-hour meeting presided over by Acting President Yemi Osinbajo.

The minister said this was aimed at checking the rising costs of food items in the country.

He said the committee would look at how the government could intervene to bring down the exorbitant cost of food items.

According to him, the task force is an inter-ministerial committee comprising the Ministers of Agriculture, Finance, Water Resources and Transportation.

He said the committee was expected to report back to the Federal Executive Council next week when concrete actions would be taken.

“Government has set up a task force on food security to ensure that an end is put to the wastages that occur and with tons and tons of produce sitting down in the farms rotting or in the markets getting rotten.

“The important thing is to look at what areas of intervention can the government make. The intervention can be in the area of subsidy in transportation that is being worked out.

“This goes to show that government is very much concerned of the rising cost of food prices, and we are responding to it. Clearly government is concern and is trying to do something to bring it down,” the minister said.