When Budget Fails, Sickness Spread Closing The Funding Gap To Stop Farm Disease ~ By Chibueze chukwuebuka.
If you travel through mbaise area covering Ahiazu,Ezinihitte, and Aboh Mbaise Local Government Areas you will see that farming is not just work, it is life.
The land is rich for cassava,yam and palm trees, while almost every house holds keeps chickens, goats,pigs to support their families. But there is a hidden powerful force that always attack these wealth and our lands full of honey and this enemy grows stronger and more stronger every time government funds are delayed.
Imagine not treating yourself earlier of early symptoms of illness or infections because of lack of money makes the case worst which can make the body prone to more deadly infections. But having money at the insecure periods makes it possible and easier for early treatment. This is exactly what is happening across Mbaise farms. When funding falls short, diseases spread quickly through both plants and animals and the cost to fix it becomes huge.
Every year, the government budgets some money to help farmers. This money is meant to pay for agricultural officers to visit villages, teach people how to spot earlier signs of troubles, buy vaccines for animals, and give advice on keeping crops safe.
But records from the 2025 - 2026 financial year according to Senate Committee in Agricultural shows that only 35% of this money has actually been released. The rest is tied up in delays, paperworks, or poor planning. Investigation shows that some of the funds have be used for personal gains which is as a result of corruption and lack of accountability from these officials or those in power -The governments. Because of this, officers rarely travel deep into rural mbaise geographical areas, the can not hold training or meetings in the communities and sometimes bringing up a professional expert that can teach and educate the semi illiterates or organize demonstrations for them on a better way of agricultural practices different from what they know.
When a disease starts in one village, there is no one to rush to in other to stop it. It spreads like smoke in a windy room. Sometimes this is as a result of zero means of transportation for agricultural experts meant for looking into these problems.
Both Crops And Animals Suffer; We often talk about cassava and palm oil, but animals are also very important here. In mbaise, a family savings often sit in their pigsty or poultry pen. When funding fails, animal protection suffers badly too.
Without money for vaccination, drugs or regular checks common sickness turn into big outbreaks. Diseases like African swine fever can wipe out an entire pig pen in a day. Avian influenza kills thousands of chickens at once, even foot and mouth diseases in goats spreads quickly because there are no officers moving around to help farmers contain it.
Mr Emeka Nikki who is a well known farmer and also a leader from Ahiazu mbaise explained "last season, we lost nearly 3 out of every 10 bags of yams to bought and mosaic virus. But for animals the pains was too deep. Small farmers suffers the most. Big commercial farmers can or might afford private vets and buy their own medicine but the average family farmers in Mbaise relies entirely on government help. When that doesn't come, they are left helpless.
Why This Matters to Every Student and Family;
When disease destroy crops in Mbaise or Mbaitolu, there is less food to bring to market in owerri and beyond even when animals die, meat,eggs and palm oil too becomes scarce. Less supply means higher prices. Even for some families that farming is their major source of income might loose huge amount of money when they are already struggling to provide for their children in school.
The citizens especially Agricultural experts, trainers farmers or livestock producers call for help, the government needed to look into these problems at hand by;
Releasing funds on time; When money is budgeted for farming and livestock, it should be sent when it is needed, not months later when the damage is done, but that is if at all the money will be released.
Secondly, the government can work together with private sector and community groups to share the cost of training farmers and providing vaccines and drugs to those rural areas in mbaise and other geographical areas.
Also government needs to create an emergency funds for quick interventions before providing any other big help.
