Agriculture should take centre stage in 2025 budget, not defence – Sen Mustapha

Senator Saliu Mustapha, representing Kwara Central, has expressed concern over the 2025 budget‘s limited focus on agriculture compared to its emphasis on security.

During a Senate debate on Thursday, Senator Mustapha highlighted the disparity, noting that the budget allocated ₦4.9 trillion to defence, the highest among all sectors, followed by infrastructure, education, and health.

He cautioned that neglecting the agricultural sector could have serious repercussions, emphasizing that food security is just as critical as other aspects of national security.

“Lack of security has brought us to this level. There are three major areas that government will always intervene. These are health, education and agriculture.

“I hope that this budget after taking care of health and education, we equally look inwards because you cannot secure the environment and you don’t have enough to deploy into agriculture for farmers to really do what they need to do.

I’m hoping that we will be able to look inward again to see what we can do to support agriculture; because with that we can produce what to eat and eat what we produce.

“All we need is to jack up our production, that is the most important aspect if not then whatever we are securing, we are securing it for vacuum.

“I hope that my colleagues at the end of the day when we are looking at the details of this budget will be able to do more for agriculture,” Senator Mustapha said