Senate President Ahmad Lawan said at the weekend that President Muhammadu Buhari has committed more resources to diversify the economy than any previous leader.
Lawan said no past government had invested as much resources particularly in agriculture as the Buhari government has done.
He made the claim on Saturday at the commissioning of a Poultry Farm Center which the National Agricultural Land Development Authourity (NALDA) established in Gasamu, in Jakusko Local Government Area of Yobe State.
The Senate President said: “We have promised to diversify the economy of this country. For more than 50 years, our economy had been dependent on one single commodity and that is oil.
“Oil does not provide so much employment opportunities. There could be revenues but definitely not the mainstream opportunities in terms of employment.
“But when you diversify into agriculture, you would have much more people engaged, especially our youths who today are largely unemployed or under employed.
“So we are diversifying the economy of Nigeria through agriculture and we have done so much as a country, as a government, in the last six years or so.
“No previous administration in Nigeria has committed as much fund, resources in agriculture than this administration.
And I stand to be contradicted, that if not because of resources that we have put in agriculture sector, Nigeria would still have been importing the food that we eat.
“But everyone knows that the rice import bill had gone so low, almost to nothing today. We used to spend billions of dollars every year to import rice but we have been producing the rice that we eat.
