The Acting President of the association, Prof. Simon Irtwange, made the appeal in an interview in Abuja on Thursday.
Irtwange, who is also the Chairman of Technical Committee on Nigeria Yam Export Programme, said that the proposed centres would enable farmers to store the yams at appropriate temperatures to prevent decay.
He said that the centres were also considered necessary as part of efforts to prevent “our yams from being rejected in the international market’’.
He said that the proposed centres would also facilitate efforts to reduce the costs of yam storage, transportation and export.
“ A yam conditioning centre is supposed to have a cooling system. The government should build modern yam conditioning centres so that the private sector can copy from it.
“It can use the modern yam conditioning centres to force down the general cost of operations,’’ he said.
Irtwange said that the second batch of yam exports to the United Kingdom (UK) was already being packaged in Benue for onward transloading to the Lagos ports.
He urged the government to intervene in efforts to overcome the delay of vehicles conveying agricultural produce in getting to their destinations, usually brought about by security agencies.
