Nigeria has become the seventh member of the G8 New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition.

The country, therefore, joins six fellow African countries Ghana, Burkina Faso, Côte d’Ivoire, Ethiopia, Mozambique and Tanzania.

Nigeria’s Minister for Agriculture and Rural Development Dr. Akinwumi Adesina made the announcement at the G8 Food Security and Nutrition events this weekend.

As a new member of the Alliance, Nigeria will seek to leverage private-sector investment and policy reform to reinforce the country’s Agricultural Transformation Agenda.

Commenting, Dr. Adesina said the inclusion in the alliance will help “Nigeria achieve its Agricultural Transformation Agenda to create 3.5 million new jobs and provide over N300 billion ($2 billion) of additional income for Nigerian farmers”.

“…Nigeria’s inclusion in this initiative backed by all the G8 countries, Nigerian agribusinesses and major multinationals will leverage our domestic resources to deliver on our country’s agricultural promise,” said Minister Adesina.

As one of the newest members of the New Alliance, Nigeria will be a strong advocate for substantive initiatives to improve agricultural production and incomes, focusing attention on empowering women farmers.

The country’s new partnership will continue to drive the imperative to reduce the food import bill, promote domestic and regional markets, and create jobs across the entire value chain, ultimately keeping the country on track to meet its agriculture target of increasing food production by 20 million metric tonnes for 2015.

The New Alliance for Food Security and Nutrition was launched by US President Barack Obama at the 2012 G-8 Summit with the initial six member countries which included Ghana.

The New Alliance has matched market-oriented regulatory reforms in the six member-countries with $3.7 billion in commitments for investment from the private sector.

Over 45 multinational and African companies have committed to specific agricultural investments that total more than $3 billion and span all areas of the agricultural value chain, including irrigation, crop protection, financing and infrastructure, according to the US Agency for International Development (USAID).