File photo shows a farming plot in Abuja, Nigeria. (Xinhua)

LAGOS, March 24 (Xinhua) -- The Nigerian government has deployed about 68,259 inmates in farm centers across the country, as congestion in the country's prisons worsened.

Spokesperson of the Nigeria Prisons Service Francis Enobore told Xinhua on Thursday that the service sunk many boreholes in 2016 and made huge investment in fish farming in order to re-position the farm centers.

Enobore said the boreholes were for all year-round practice of irrigation farming that could take care of the dry seasons.

The burden of feeding the inmates may have informed the decision of the prisons service to send inmates to its farm centers to produce the foodstuff needed to feed them.

The Prisons Service Management Team recently resuscitated the moribund prison farm centers across the country for the purpose of "massive food production" to feed the inmates.

Of the overall figure of inmates being guarded by the prisons authority, it was gathered that 46,351 are those awaiting trial, while the remaining 21,903 are already convicted.