OK, folks, I didn’t think I would have to say anything about Nigeria’s maize market for some time, but here we go. The Nigerian government wants to ban the exports of maize. Since Nigeria is a prominent African country, this has caught some headlines.
But, Nigeria is not an essential player in the maize trade. I am looking at Nigeria’s maize export data from 1960; the highest export volume was in 2016, at about 200k tonnes. This is small (by comparison, countries like South Africa export over 3,0 million tonnes of maize in favourable seasons).
The reason is that while the country plants maize in 5,5 million hectares (twice the size of maize plantings in South Africa), the yields are poor, and the harvest is typically 12,5 million tonnes. By contrast, South Africa plants about 2,5 million hectares and has harvested over 16,0 million tonnes. The difference is the seed cultivars, fertilizer usage, and farming techniques, amongst other things.
Nigeria wants to criminalize maize exports because of the relatively poor yield and higher prices. The USDA estimates Nigeraia’s maize harvest for the 2023-24 season to be 11,0 million tonnes, down from 12,9 million tonnes in the past season.
This is slightly below their annual consumption of 12,7 million tonnes. So, they will likely bring around 110k tonnes through imports to fulfil the shortfall. These tight maize supplies have led to the move to ban exports.
Nigeria’s temporary absence in maize exports may not necessarily have noteworthy implications for the global (maize) market. It may slightly affect the neighbouring countries.
Overall, Nigeria’s pedestrian maize production tells us the country must do more to improve its productivity. This requires embracing openness to biotech, amongst other interventions I discussed in this TED Talk.
I hope you can watch the 11-minute clip to appreciate South Africa’s progress in its agriculture and learn about what countries on the African continent can learn from South Africa’s experience.
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