The Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC) has said grain hoarders and smugglers are to blame for food inflation in Nigeria.
FCCPC’s Executive Vice Chairman (EVC), Tunji Bello said this on Wednesday during a town hall meeting with industry leaders, micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs), market heads, farmers, transporters, and service providers in Kano.
The meeting follows similar interactive sessions held in Abuja and Lagos, as part of FCCPC’s ongoing efforts to curb anti-consumer practices across the country.
Bello revealed that FCCPC investigators had discovered that some “unscrupulous grain merchants” were stockpiling newly harvested grains in warehouses to create artificial scarcity, exacerbating food inflation in Nigeria.
“Without caring for the consequences of their action on fellow countrymen and women, some of these unscrupulous actors go as far as taking some of the food items they had mopped up from the farmers or the markets and smuggling them across the borders to sell at premium, thereby endangering our national food security,” Bello said.
He appealed to the Kano stakeholders to collaborate in ending unethical practices that contribute to price inflation in the national interest.
“Don’t get us wrong; we are by no means saying everyone is guilty here. We only have few bad eggs involved in such unethical practices,” he said.
“It is therefore our collective responsibility to work together to achieve reasonable pricing of goods and services, especially at a time the country is undergoing bold economic reforms which may bring temporary discomfort today but will definitely usher a better economy for us tomorrow.”
In addition to grain hoarding, Bello identified price fixing and artificial barriers imposed by market associations, such as entrance levies, as other unethical practices.
Bello said the FCCPC Act prescribes severe penalties, including fines and jail terms for offenders, but the commission prefers to begin with dialogue, in the “spirit of democracy”.
