An economist, Prof. AbdulGafar ljaya, has called for a price war against imported rice.
Ijaya, who teaches economics at the University of llorin, made the call on Monday in llorin in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria.
He said the price war would crash the price at which smuggled rice is being sold in Nigeria,
The don, who was reacting to the more than N30,000 which a bag of rice is sold in llorin and some other parts of the country, noted that with a price war, the price of the rice would drop and affordable.
“There must be a price war to crash the price of imported rice being smuggled into our country so that the downtrodden can afford it,” ljaya said.
He noted that the Federal Government had spent so much to improve the local production of rice which, he said, was being ridiculed by some unpatriotic Nigerians.
The economic expert said the high cost of rice in some parts of Nigeria was not caused by any government but as a result of lack of honesty, greed and inordinate ambition of some Nigerians.
“Some traders will travel to the northern part of the country to buy rice at cheap price only to re-bag it in bags with foreign names and later sell them at triple the price,’’ he said.
Ijaya called for attitudinal change, discipline, patriotism, honesty to allow the price war against imported, smuggled rice to succeed.
He advised Nigerians to always patronise “Made-in-Nigeria’’ goods to enhance the nation’s economic growth and development.
