Governors of Lagos, Ondo and Niger States yesterday called for a major shift toward structured, patient capital to boost Nigeria’s agribusiness value chain and drive non-oil export growth.
They spoke on Wednesday in Lagos at the opening ceremony of the FirstBank Agric and Export Expo 2026 with the theme ‘From farm to global markets: Building Nigeria’s Export Value Chain.’
Addressing the gathering Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu, represented by the Commissioner for Agriculture and Food Systems, Ruth Olusanya, stressed that unlocking the nation’s true economic strength requires financial institutions to adapt to the unique operational realities of agribusinesses.
‘A good harvest without financing cannot become a good business, and a good product without access to markets cannot become a successful export.
‘Our financing structures must recognize the realities of agriculture, including planting and harvest cycles, rather than imposing conventional short-term financing models on long-term agricultural businesses. This is an area where institutions such as FirstBank can make a transformative difference,’ Sanwo-Olu said.
Sanwo-Olu further urged financial institutions and agro-processors to prioritize local value addition, warning that raw commodity exports limit economic prosperity.
Aiyedatiwa said Ondo State’s agricultural potential in cocoa, oil palm, cassava, fisheries, aquaculture, and livestock would only translate into prosperity if the government and the private sector developed the full value chains around those commodities.
‘Comparative advantage alone does not create prosperity,’ Aiyedatiwa said. ‘Our responsibility as a government is to convert the comparative advantage into competitive advantage.’
He said his administration was therefore moving beyond primary production to areas including ‘quality inputs and production, aggregation, processing, storing, logistics, traceability and standards, financing and ultimately access to domestic and international markets.’
Aiyedatiwa identified insecurity as one of the major constraints to agricultural expansion, saying attacks and other security challenges were limiting farmers’ ability to expand their farms and increase productivity.
Bago, meanwhile, warned that Nigeria’s dependence on food imports was unsustainable and called for a deliberate national policy to prioritise domestic production.
He also emphasised what he called food sovereignty, describing it as paramount.
He said Nigeria had imported food worth more than $3 billion in the year, with the figure potentially reaching $4 billion before the end of the year.
‘It is scary,’ Bago said.
Reaffirming the lender’s commitment to supporting the sector, Chief Executive Officer of FirstBank Group, Olusegun Alebiosu, stated that the bank is shifting its operational focus from high-level conversations to targeted execution and capital deployment.
‘Our objective is not only to showcase opportunities within agriculture and exports but also to facilitate the connections, partnerships, financing solutions, market access opportunities, and knowledge exchange required to transform ideas into thriving enterprises,’ Alebiosu said.
‘Over the years, this Expo has evolved into a leading platform for conversations and collaborations that advance Nigeria’s agricultural and non-oil export sectors,’ he added.
Highlighting the macroeconomic perspective, FirstBank Chief Economist Chinwe Egwim noted that despite agriculture contributing over 20 per cent to Nigeria’s Gross Domestic Product, the sector generates just 4.1 per cent of total merchandise export earnings.
‘When a sector that is contributing as high as 20 per cent to total GDP is only contributing about 4.1 per cent to merchandise trade, that creates compelling opportunities for growth.
‘Capital becomes more powerful when it connects these opportunities rather than treating each part of the value chain in isolation. Financing additional production has greater commercial impact when there is sufficient capacity to aggregate, to store, or to process that output,’ Egwim said.
Consul General of Brazil in Lagos State, Ronaldo Vieira, also shared insights from Brazil’s two-century agricultural transformation, noting that sustainable agro-export expansion relies on integrated collaboration between public policy, research bodies, private finance, and farmers.