At a workshop on ‘Sustainable Agriculture under Economic Recession, the  Managing Director/CEO Farming Africa, Marc van der Sterren , said The Federal Government of Nigeria has been called upon to adopt The Netherland’s agricultural model to increase its food security, and “I would appeal to the Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Chief Audu Ogbeh, in the biggest African country, who is not only the Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, but also a farmer, to focus on the empowerment of smallholder family farmers by providing them access to independent information, knowledge and education.”  He noted that the focus should not just be on economy and increasing food quantities through big industrialized agribusinesses, but the first aim should be at the smallholder family farmer, on leading subsistence farmers on a path towards sustainable commercial farming and on empowering all family farmers through independent information. According to him, ‘Yes, our agriculture is an international economic success. The Netherlands, also called Holland is self-reliant in food production and the second agricultural exporter of the world, next to the United States, and The Unites States is number one; The Netherlands is number two. We are not only a big exporter; we are also the fifth importer of agricultural goods in the world. In fact, we are not only a big agricultural nation, first and for all we are a trading nation.”For example, in 2013 the Netherlands imported 3.3 billion roses worth roughly $400 million. In the same year we exported more than 3.3 billion roses worth roughly $1.1 billion. So we add about 200 percent of the value by handling, packing, transporting and processing.

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