The Federal Government (FG) has commenced the sale of 30, 000 metric tonnes of milled rice to Nigerians at a subsidized rate of N40,000 per 50 kilogram (Kg) bag, and potential buyers would have to present their National Identification Number (NIN) as a requirement.
This was disclosed on Thursday during the flag-off ceremony by Minister of Agriculture and Food Security, Abubakar Kyari, who represented President Bola Tinubu.
He said, “This food intervention can be said to be timely considering the times and challenges we are in as citizens of this great nation.
“As one of the numerous efforts of the present administration to cushion the effect of high cost of food commodities, kindly join me in applauding the immense efforts of the present administration such as the release of 42,000MT of Assorted Food Commodities (AFC) to vulnerable and the 30,000MT of milled rice which is being flagged-off for sales to Nigerians today September 5, 2024.”
Explaining further, the Director of Strategic Grains Reserve, Ministry of Agriculture, Haruna Sule said, “To qualify for the one person one bag, you must have a National Identification Number, of course, you have phone numbers and those in public service are all registered under the Integrated Payroll and Personal Information System (IPPIS) platform.
“Once you have any of these three, at the point of sale, with the NIN logged into the system, a code number and a Treasury receipt will be generated, and with that, the buyer can get to the collection centre and pick up his bag. The receipt will indicate, the time and point of collection to eliminate stampede.”
Recall that in July, the FG announced the sale of subsidized rice but later suspended the exercise.