Nigeria seeking Gulf farmland investment

By Amena Bakr

DUBAI (Reuters) - Nigeria is offering to lease farmland to Gulf countries seeking food security and will allow investors to export all of their produce, the head of a private Nigerian agriculture consultancy firm said on Monday.

Gulf Arab countries reliant on food imports have intensified efforts over the last year to buy land in developing nations ranging from Pakistan to the Sudan and Ethiopia.

"Nigeria has the terrain to provide 100 percent of the Gulf's food needs," Enbong Jimie Idiong, chief executive of Global Corp Ltd, told Reuters in an interview on the sidelines of an industry conference in Dubai.

Global Corp Ltd is working as a consultant to the Nigerian government on ways to develop the agriculture sector, Idiong said.

Nigeria has around 71.2 million hectares of farmland, of which less that 50 percent is being used, according to data from the firm.

"We need investment to fully utilize this land and we will allow the investors to export back 100 percent of the crop and this will create employment opportunities for people in Nigeria," said Idiong.

The land could be leased for up to 30 to 40 years at a cost of around $10,000 per hectare for that period, he said.

"Because of the large size of land we can offer investors as much as they want, and there is no particular kind of crop that can't be grown in Nigeria."