Land Use Tenure In Nigeria

Nigeria stifles opportunity in Agriculture with an obsolete land tenure system. Most farming in Nigeria occurs at the rural areas and such lands under the control of states and local governments, are becoming critical for Agriculture and food security.

With the Nigerian state having possession of the lands and citizens only granted right of occupancy and lease for 99 years, there is still a challenge in land acquisition due to government bureaucracy.

Most lands of ancestral ownership are difficult to formalize making them unsuitable as collateral for acquiring loans. It is also difficult to transfer land ownership, as every request has requires the assent of the Governor of the state.

With the current land tenure system, it is can be a disincentive to allow commercial investments especially from foreign investors in agriculture. Government needs to review the Land Use Act and ensure that there are opportunities to make land more accessible for Nigerians who want to do agriculture.

This is the last post in the #DoAgric series and we have looked at issues of budget transparency, agriculture and national development, potential crops, gender gap in agriculture, young people in agriculture and also the Maputo Declaration.

We advise that we keep the conversation going as this is the initial phase of the campaign. #DoAgric is a multi-stakeholder campaign to get government to increase public funding for agriculture, close the gender gap in Agriculture and also support young farmers tagged “the Replacement Generation”