Hunger Is The Root Cause Of Mental Imbalance – Don

By Queendaline Elo

A university don and founder of a non-profit organization known as The Mighty One Empowerment Foundation (TEMOEFA), Professor Barika Dominic Saro-Laka, has identified hunger to be responsible for mental imbalance in the society.

Speaking in an interview as a guest on globally syndicated 97 media stations powered by Dr. Bright Echendu of TSTV and anchored by Emmanuel Daudu on the theme “Zero Hunger: United Nations SDG Goal 2” yesterday, January 18, the development activist, described hunger as the world’s first potent killer, inducer of diseases, booster of crimes, and propeller of despondency and social frustration in the society.

He equated hunger with evil, as according to him, it permanently pushes down production, which is at its lowest ebb, thereby making the masses to suffer an untold dimension of hardship.
The professor harped on the necessity for enhancing policies and schemes that could enhance the realization of food sufficiency and food security for the well-being of humanity.

The humanist commended the efforts of the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO), ActionAid, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Bill Clinton Foundation, and Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition (GAIN) for helping people to feed well and live long.

He also lauded the various initiatives and interventions of the NIRSAL Microfinance Bank Limited, Bank of Industry, African Development Bank, Nigeria Incentive-Based Risk Sharing System for Agricultural Lending (NIRSAL Plc), and the Bank of Agriculture (BOA) for aiding farmers and agro-allied entrepreneurs to produce more food and raw materials in Nigeria.

However, the activist called on the Federal Republic of Nigeria to increase budgetary allocations for these agencies to enable them play more active roles in order to reduce the high level of hunger in the country.

Continuing, Saro-Laka advised the United Nations to demand concrete evidence of steps taken and the results achieved in crushing down the high tide of hunger from delegations to represent different countries as it hosts the Zero Hunger Review Summit in New York this year.

He explained that majority of African citizens were the worst hit as their leaders are sitting on the fence and watching their citizens die as a result of minor and preventable diseases caused by hunger.
The activist urged African leaders to step up the fight against hunger by working to improve the living conditions of their people so as to justify their elections into various offices.

Professor Saro-Laka explained that the understanding of the harm, pains and agonies caused by hunger has often propelled his non-governmental organisation (NGO) to regularly distribute various food items and health accessories to abandoned and neglected needy individuals and groups such as widows, orphanages, physically-challenged persons, old people’s homes, leprosy centres, and lDP Camps while providing free training on agricultural extension services and planting techniques to rural farmers.

The visiting professor to HIPDET University, USA, and British American University, United Kingdom, also lauded the efforts of Theobarth Global Foundation and the World Sustainable Development Goal Organisation (WOSDEGO), in reducing hunger in the land, requesting individuals to engage in subsistence agriculture in order to complement the efforts of commercial farmers and cottage industrialists so as to meet the food supply needs of Nigeria’s large population.
He also advised the government to devote a certain percentage of the annual budget for the provision of machineries, fertilizers and equipment as well as for storage and processing facilities and insecticides to assist farmers attain maximum food production and sustainability in this sub-sector.

“Governments, at all levels, through their various implementing and regulatory agencies must adopt discreet selection processes to prevent fraudsters tagged “handbag farmers” from getting access to soft loans meant for actual and active farmers so that the huge resources being deployed in this direction can be tangibly felt”, he pleaded.