 with the launching of the anchor borough's program. Very few realized then what that step would mean for our country. We are now poised to deliver a rice production on a scale such as has not been seen anywhere in Africa. Today, by some estimates, we produce 17 million tons of paddy. But we must note that our investment in agriculture is still probably under 100 billion naira, and in rice even less. This demonstrates that were we to double that investment, especially in the incremental provision of inputs, irrigation and processing capacity, who will easily become one of the top three producers of rice in the world in another two, three years. It was His Excellency the Governor of KB State who demonstrated with facts and figures at a NEC meeting that if we spend even 25% of what we currently spend on the petroleum sector on farming, we would create at least 6 million more jobs and easily achieve double-digit GDP growth. Our vision can only be stultified by the smuggling of rice. Smuggling, as you've heard, is clearly economic sabotage. It is the economic equivalent of warfare against our nation because it destroys economic livelihoods and impoverishes our people. All of our efforts can be killed by the dumping of subsidized rice from Asia. Yesterday, at the meeting of the economic management team, we held a special session on smuggling. The meeting was attended by the Governors of KB and Jigawa, the Customs, Immigration and even the Air Force. We confirmed that smuggling was going on unabated through Niger, Cameroon and Benner Republic. Benner Republic, of course, as we've heard is a nation that eats probably only between 400 and 500 metric tons of white rice and it now imports over 1.8 million metric tons of purple rice annually. In the same 2017, where they imported 1.8 million metric tons of purple rice, we imported only 23,000 metric tons of purple rice. Clearly the port in Benner is now almost entirely used as a staging post for rice smuggling into Nigeria. We have drawn up a list of actions for Mr. President's consideration that we propose should be taken to drastically reduce smuggling. The EMT will, in consultation also with Rice Producers Association, draw up an incentive regime that would radically improve increased rice production. As we speak in the banquet hall here at the State House, there is a focus lab going on between the Ministry of Agriculture, the Ministry of Industry, Trade and Investment, the Ministry of Budget and Planning and investors in the Agriculture of value chain. The idea of the lab is to provide a meeting point between investors in agriculture and government agencies who grant approvals and licenses necessary to ensure that their investments thrive. Mr. President, the most important resource this country has are our determined and committed people and they deserve all of our commendation. The farmers and millers who believe and trust this government and Mr. President enough to invest their resources based on your expression of your vision alone. The governors who have shown great leadership and vision, in particular the governors of KB, Jigawa, Lagos and Eboni State. The Honorable Minister of Agriculture, under whose watch we have seen some of the most exciting developments in agriculture in recent history. The CBN governor whose passion and commitment for agriculture is unparalleled and whose passion for the nation causes him to wear a green tie every single day. The Chief of Staff who, despite the fact that he has no farming skills whatsoever, he only an intellectual, has worked hard and relentlessly, not just on the fertilizer and other initiatives that have brought so dramatically, that have brought agricultural production so dramatically improved and has improved the general outlook of the economy. Mr. President, I congratulate you on the important achievement of a major campaign promise. You had said even during the campaigns that agriculture mining and jobs from the building of our railways will be a strategy for quickly producing jobs. You are absolutely right. With regard to agriculture and especially rice production, that point has not only been very well proved, but we are also on the threshold of exponentially increasing jobs and opportunities for our people, especially in the rice sub-sector of agriculture. Thank you very much.