The senate is considering a bill seeking to create a database for cows in the country.
Sponsor of the Bill for an Act to Establish the National Livestock Identification and Management Bureau, Senator Muhammad Enagi Bima (APC, Niger South) said the livestock sub-sector is an integral part of agriculture and vital to the socio-economic development of the country, though its productivity currently is very low.
The bill scaled second reading at Tuesday’s plenary session.
The bureau will be in charge of identification, traceability and registration of livestock such as cows and goats to among other things curb cattle rustling.
It will also ensure the protection, control and management of all livestock in Nigeria.
A similar bill was considered by the previous senate but it was not passed.
He stressed that the piece of legislation under consideration seeks to solve the challenge of animal identification and management in Nigeria.
-Advertisement-
According to the lawmaker, the Bureau when established would be responsible for livestock identification, traceability, registration, cattle rustling control, livestock disease control, among others.
“It accounts for one-third of Nigeria’s agricultural GDP, providing income, employment, meat, milk, leather, farm energy, manure, fuel, and transport.
“Recent estimates indicate that Nigeria’s national livestock comprises 18.4 million cattle, 43.4 million sheep, 76 million goats and 7.5 million pigs”, Bima said.
President of the Senate, Ahmad Lawan, said the development of the livestock industry in Nigeria is critical to the diversification and growth of economy.
According to Lawan, the livestock industry in Nigeria, if properly harnessed and regulated, has the potential of generating trillions of Naira needed to stimulate the economy along the trajectory of exponential growth.
He said: “This is an industry of between N5 to N10 trillion Naira in this country. [And] any government or parliament will try to do anything possible to ensure that such an industry is protected and promoted to ensure that people earn their livelihood and have a food reserve of sort from that industry.
READ ALSO: Derek Chauvin found guilty of all charges in death of George Floyd
“I believe that in this Senate, we even had a resolution or intervention that was based on the Doctrine of necessity, because there was need for the National Assembly to intervene even when it was clear that there was no provision for such a situation.
“Sitting here, I believe that we will be doing this country good, we will be doing justice and a great deal of service to our people that we legislate on this.
“The identification is just one side of it, but the protection and management of this sector of our economy that is so huge and massive is critical to our economy.
“It is not something that we will leave to the states to do whatever they want to do. Let the states also try to legislate to compliment whatever the National Assembly will do.
“So, based on Standing Order 25(h) which gives me the authority to interpreted both our standing orders – the rules and constitutional point of orders – I rule that this Senate and, indeed, the National Assembly has the legislative competence to legislate on this matter”, the Senate President said.
The Committees are also expected to turn in their reports within four weeks.
We do everything possible to supply quality news and information to all our valuable readers day in, day out and we are committed to keep doing this.
Your kind donation will help our continuous research efforts.
-Advertisement-
-Want to get the news as it breaks?-
