Barrister Raymos Guanah is the chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Raymos Guanah Farms Limited, the largest mechanized and integrated farm in Delta State. He is a seasoned legal practitioner and politician who has combined both fields successfully in spite of the difficulties faced by most of his peer in the state. In this interview with Tejiri Ebikeme/Francis Sadhere in Asaba, Guanah spoke on ways to boost the economy of the country through mechanized farming considering the dwindling prices of crude oil in the world. He talks about his plans to engage fifty Delta youths in mechanized farming which will in turn reduce unemployment of the youths in the state amongst other things. Excerpt:

 

Sir, please may we meet you and know what you are currently into?

My name is Raymos Guanah. I am a lawyer, farmer and politician. I am the CEO of Raymos Guanah farms. The company has many branches and we deal on oil palm, maize, cassava, rice and fish farming. What I am doing now is that we are trying to take agriculture a step further and that is why we have partnered with institutions that can assist us. We have signed an MoU with the National Agriculture Research Institute at Ibadan. As I am talking to you now we have an agreement with Lake Chad Basin and they are coming with a pilot scheme where they will plant six types of wheat species in Delta State and whichever one is good for our soil, we are going to start planting it. We are also registered with the National Agricultural Seed Council, NASC to produce certified seeds like maize, rice, etc to farmers. We have just set up our own one ton per hour Rice Mill as our own contribution to food production for Nigerians. Our machine can produce twenty bags of fifty Kg per hour, but for now we are doing twenty-five Kg per hour. We intend to launch our products into the tables of Nigerians this season.

Why did you decide to go into farming?

Why not farming for Guanah and every Nigerian? The truth is that Nigeria is one country that is blessed with fertile soil but it so unfortunate that Nigerians have not realized the blessings we have in agriculture. We have put farming behind us these days. I remember when I was growing up, what we used to see in our school readers is groundnut pyramids, cocoa, timber, rubber, oil palm. Nobody has come to take these things from us but we have chosen to abandon these agricultural prospective for oil. Agriculture was our major revenue before oil was discovered. And what we would have done is that we would have used our proceeds from oil to promote agriculture. Today we import everything we import tomatoes, pepper, rice, onion, and recently, I hear we are importing garri from Ghana. So, every Nigerian must own a garden if he cannot own a farm so that he will not have to buy pepper, vegetable, onions, okro etc. Most Nigerians prefer to buy everything instead of just going to their backyard to get vegetable, pepper, okro and the rest. So Guanah is here to make a point to Nigerians that they can go into agriculture and in the process they can provide food for themselves and others. Apart from that the interesting about agriculture is that you are also making money for yourself. You lose nothing from going into agriculture, rather you will get accolade that you are employing people and making money for yourself.

As we approach the dry season, what crops you are intending to plant?

We have concluded plans to do dry season farming for rice. We have 4 inches plant water pump machines and we have ten of them. Each of them can do nine thousand acres of farm land. So we can flood any rice land. We have also procured back holes which we can use to dig small boreholes to retain water. Also, in addition to the wheat the Lake Chad Basin is going to bring, we have also introduced cucumber as our pilot project.

Why are Nigerians in love with imported rice as against the local rice? How do we change their attitude?

For anybody to prefer imported rice to locally produced rice is just ignorance because you cannot compare the nutritional value of the locally produced rice with the imported rice. The Nigerian processed rice is very high in nutrient. There is no Nigerian rice in the warehouse that has lasted for more than six months there. I can say without any fear of contradiction that there is no imported rice that has lasted less than three years in the warehouse in their country before they are shipped here.

How do we get the people to eat Nigerian rice? The challenge goes to the farmer and the processors because the complain we always hear is that there are too much stones in the local rice. Nigerian farmers and processors must take step to ensure that there are no stones in our rice. Before we even start to process and mill we have a grader and distiller that remove the sands and stones. By the time our rice pass through these two stages, there will be no stone in our rice.

To encourage people to patronize local rice, I think the government should start the process by making sure that all government institutions – right from the primary, secondary, tertiary, local government, state government, and federal government – in the country are encouraged to eat local rice. Nigerian rice farmers and processors should be encouraged to produce quality rice for the country. Government should encourage farmers, right from land preparation, planting, harvesting, threshing, winnowing. A lot of persons can be engaged in this long process.

What is your source of funding?

It is very unfortunate that up till this moment I have not gotten any assistance from the bank, federal government, state government or local government. But when the governor came to commission my rice mill, he promised to give us a tractor which we are very thankful to him. We are in the process of getting that tractor. So this is the very first time that government has tried to help us since we started about ten years ago. I am also aware that the governor has intervened when camp 74 fish farmers lost their products to flood. He has also given fingerlings to farmers, day old chick, cassava stem and a lot of other things to farmers in the state.

There are indications that you will soon venture into sugar cane production, what is motivating you to venture into this area?

I am the state chairman of sugarcane producers. Like rice, we also import sugar into the country. It is unfortunate that just like we have our own local rice production, we do not have our locally processed sugar. But we have all its takes to plant sugarcane and process sugar. We want to first of all get those interested in sugarcane production and we are going to give them small processors that they will use to beat the sugarcane. After that we can think of the processing companies who will process this sugarcane into sugar. So we are at the first stage of getting the raw materials for sugar industries. It is a shame that right from when I was born till now we are still importing sugar and there are no indications that we will start processing sugar. But we must start from somewhere.

As a farmer, how do you see Nigerian Economy in the future?

Nigerian economy has all along depended on oil. But it is very clear to all that there now alternatives to oil being developed all over the world. Therefore agriculture is room for us to boost our economy. Every day we take Ovaltine, Milo, Bournvita, etc that are made from cocoa that was taken from Nigerian to other country and is brought back to us as beverages. Why cant we just process these beverages ourselves? It is like our crude oil. They take our crude oil and pay peanuts for it, they process into many products and they bring it back to us and we pay heavily for it. These things do not make sense to me. It is so sad that we take our cocoa outside the country to process it into beverages when we can them on our own. Even those few companies that are trying to process these beverages, they are not surviving because the government has not made the climate conducive for them. If we could get ten companies processing cocoa in Nigeria we are going to ban the importation of beverages just like we are banning importation of rice.

Do you think Nigerians have embraced the back to land policy?

No they have not. We still need to do a lot of advocacy on that. When we say back to land, it does not mean that everybody must go back to farming. Like I said earlier, everybody can plant something in their backyard so that at the end of the day, you can beat your chest and say, I did not buy pepper throughout the year. If you calculate the amount of money you are spending to buy pepper every year, you will be surprised at the amount. If you have pepper at your backyard you would have ended saving so much money at the end of the year.

Some few individuals importing these things and are making so much money from them might be the ones frustrating government efforts to try and ban these things. How do you respond to this?

It is not impossible. But I want to let you know that no individual is bigger than this country. If government takes a stand on what it wants to do, it can overcome these few individuals. You can see what is happening in the banning of importation of rice. Custom is saying that you can bring rice through the borders. I think this is contradiction. If you are banning importation, you are banning it for good. It does not have to come by road. What this means is that all the rice coming from abroad can go to Ghana and Cotonou and berth and from there they bring them through road to Nigeria. The CG of custom should be called to order and asked to retract that statement. We do not want rice to come into the country from any source.

What can be done to encourage our unemployed graduates to go into farming rather than waiting for jobs that are not there?

We can do that through mechanization of agriculture. If we are doing mechanized farming you can go to farm with your suit and tie and nobody will know that you are coming from the farm. Many people still think that agriculture is still done with hoes and cutlasses, but this is not true. Government should try and get enough tractors that will help clear, till and plow the land for people. This is what people are afraid of when they think of agriculture. But with land preparation done, the rest is easy. Government should also produce agrochemicals. You do not have to weed the farm everyday or every week. There are chemicals that can do that for you. You do not need cutlass and hoes that will do anything for you. Government should also provide improved seedlings and cuttings for farmers at affordable prices. Number three is that farmers must have ready market for their produce. I have a program now that we are doing now that will engage fifty graduates who have five acre of land to cultivate rice. We will assist these fifty graduates with land preparation. We are also going to provide them with improved seedlings and bird repellant. While waiting for the rice to mature, we are going to give them monthly stipends until the rice are ready for harvest. At the end of the day when the harvest time comes we are going to buy all the rice from them and we will calculate all the money that we have spent on the land preparation, improved seedling, and the monthly stipends that we have given them and deduct the money from them gradually. All they have to do is to maintain the rice and make sure that nothing happens to the rice. After they finish paying us the money we spent on them, we will let them go on their own and they will become our out-growers. They will supply us with rice anytime we need rice.

Is it true that Raymos Guanah has abandoned politics for farming?

No, it is not true. I am still very much in politics. There are many politicians in Nigeria who are not doing anything other thing apart from politics. And this is very wrong. Every politician must have something to fall back on when the chips are down. I am a lawyer and I still practice. We have engineers, actors, and other professionals who are in politics and still practicing their trades. I got involved in election and when I did not win, the next day I was in court.

If you are made a minister or commissioner for agriculture today, what will you do differently?

The first thing I will do is to make sure that everybody in this country owns a garden. I will also look for areas of comparative advantage. If I see that a certain area is good for cultivation of cassava, groundnut, rice, sugarcane, or any other crop, I will concentrate on that area so that everybody will know that if they needed a particular crop, they can go to a particular area to get it. I want people to know Delta State a producer of rice. I will also make sure that there is a food market and a food bank in the state where different kinds of food are sold and the ones that are not sold will be stored in the food bank for the future. Ethiope East is recognized for the cultivation of beans. This country is so fertile that everywhere you turn you see weed growing rapidly in all areas.

What will be your advice for those who want to venture into agriculture?

I will advice them to start small. Before you start, you should also have a mentor, someone you look up to advice. I have seen friends who jumped into fish farming and jumped out and told themselves that they will never involve in fish farming till they die. I have also seen people jumped into piggery without asking question about the challenges and the rest. Of course they all ended up badly.

Is Guanah a happy farmer?

I am not just a happy farmer, I am a proud farmer and that is why I brand myself everywhere I go. I am proud that I am contributing to job creation and food production for the nation. Agriculture gives you a lot of peace because no youth will come and disturb you and tell you that he works for you. It is not like politics. Take for example these fifty youths I told you earlier that we are going to take. You will not see them in Asaba begging anybody for money. They are going to have seventy Kg of rice and from that they will get three thousand Kg of rice at harvest time. So they will not come to you.

What are some of the challenges?

Funding is very crucial in agriculture. The banks do not care if you are a farmer. All they care about is how much money you are coming to deposit in your account. They do not give loans to farmers. The second challenge is access to agro-chemicals. The third one is access to improved seedlings and cuttings. And for those doing poultry, getting good data packs and drugs for their animals is a great challenge too. I will tell that today we have not been able to produce one percent of our pineapple needs in this country. So the market is there.