CSJ Publishes Pullout of Projects For Women In Agric In 2022 Federal & 5 State Budgets

The Centre for Social Justice has published a review of the 2022 budget of the federal government and of the states of Nasarawa, Oyo, Jigawa, Anambra and Niger on Agriculture.

The Pullouts are produced to provide information to the Small Scale Women Farmers Organisation of Nigeria (SWOFON) on the provisions of the 2022 budget on agriculture containing projects which may be of interest and benefit to them.

The documents are part of CSJ’s technical support to SWOFON to strengthen the campaign for improved access to agriculture equipment and inputs for smallholder women farmers in Nigeria with funding from the International Budget Partnership.

CSJ recommends that the government’s allocation to agriculture as a key driver of the Nigerian economy should be increased to not less than 50% of the Malabo/Maputo commitment of 10% of overall budget.

It is important that the budget is designed in accordance with the policy-plan-budget continuum to reflect the full implementation of the Nigerian Gender Policy and the National Gender Policy in Agriculture.

It is also important that legislators consider dedicating a significant proportion of constituency project allocation to issues thrown up by SWOFON.

The budget should also provide gender friendly machinery and equipment such as hand sprayers, power tillers, ploughs, planters among others, especially low cost and locally fabricated equipment which can be easily maintained by local artisans.

These technical supports stem from CSJ’s effort in establishing a baseline through research on the credibility of federal and state level budgets in terms of amounts of expenditure budgeted and actual releases and utilization and from studies on the link between appropriation and plans and policies in agriculture. This is in recognition of the fact that Nigeria is a signatory to a plethora of international standards that demand improvements in gender relations.

Nigeria has formulated national policies on agriculture and gender in agriculture. Also, the Small-Scale Women Farmers Organisation in Nigeria (SWOFON) has designed a Charter of Demands, hence there is need for the women farmers to know how much of the contents of the Charter are provided for in national and state budgets. The project is in line with CSJ’s intervention in determining the level of involvement of citizens including SWOFON in the budgeting process, from the determination of priorities to other budget stages. This also includes issues around transparency and accountability.

Find the links to the documents below