Business
Govt To Purchase Cassava Floor Plants – Minister
The Federal Government has commenced plans to facilitate the purchase and installation of 18 large scale high quality cassava flour plants that would mill 1.3 million metric tonnes of high quality cassava flour per year.
The plants which would be run by the private sector, would be fully operational within 18 months, all across the cassava growing areas of the country, just as the nation’s cassava flour policy was directed at replacing some of the wheat flour in bread with a view to saving over N250 Billion annually “in wheat imports”.
Disclosing this Thursday while speaking at the end of a 3-day 39th Regular Meeting of the National Council on Agriculture and Rural Development held in Enugu , the Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Dr Akinwumi Adesina, explained that this alone would make Nigeria the largest producer of cassava flour in the world. ”While skeptics at home wonder, other countries are noticing and applauding Nigeria. Already few African countries have indicated they would import high quality cassava flour from Nigeria as they too wish to follow Nigeria’s example in substituting cassava flour for wheat”.
Continuing, the minister further said: “The tide is turning. Africans are waking up and turning what used to be a poor man’s crop into a commercial crop for the breakfast table and Nigeria is leading the way. Our time for freedom has come. Our president has set a clear direction: We must eat what we produce, and produce what we eat. Mr. President eats cassava bread. Our cassava flour policy is directed at replacing some of the wheat flour bread to save over 250 Billion naira annually in wheat imports”.
He maintained that “Our research institutions, International Institute of Tropical Agriculture, Federal Institute for Industrial Research have produced cassava bread. In the past, cassava farmers got excited and grew cassava but the flour mills did not buy the flour from the cassava processors and caused the collapse of some 135 small and medium scale processors” he stated.
According to him, the largest bakeries in Nigeria have all signed on to commercialise the cassava bread”, adding that the United Trading Company {UTC} had launched its cassava bread on a commercial scale.
The minister also disclosed that Nigeria’s Cocoa Transformational action plan was already making waves across Africa, adding that the release of the Eight Cocoa Hybrids in Nigeria “now puts us in a position to reach the One Million MT export volume within ten years”.
On efforts to make Nigeria self sufficient in rice production, Adesina regretted that Nigeria spends over 350 Billion Naira per year or one billion every day to import rice, disclosing that “our rice transformation plan action plan has a target to make Nigeria self sufficient in rice production by 2015”.
His words: “We are working to ensure that Nigeria has 100 industrial scale rice mills with capacity in place to mill 2.1million MT of high quality rice that can compete with imported rice. They will be in operation within 18months, run by the private sector”.
Also speaking at the ceremony, the Deputy Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), in charge of Financial System Stability, Dr. Kingsley Moghalu, revealed that the apex bank had initiated a policy through which a concrete plan had been designed to facilitate lending to farmers.
The policy, Nigeria Incentive Based Risk Sharing System for Agricultural Lending, (NIRSAL), he said would gulp N 75 billion to ensure its step-by-step based implementation.
Explaining the rationale behind the CBN’s NIRSAL policy, he said it was worrisome that despite the fact that agriculture contributed about 40 percent to the country’s GDP, it received less than 2 percent of bank’s lending.
He said the reason for the development was not un-connected to the much attachment to oil sector, stressing that “we are ready to change all that. Banks will now have overwhelming desire to lend to the people for agricultural purposes. Agriculture is a miracle about to happen”.
According to him, banks would be rated by the apex bank on how they lend to agriculture, adding “implementation of NIRSAL based lending is targeted to commence this March, 2012”.
Business
Food Vendors, Others Relocate To New Site At PH Airport
The raging controversy between the Port Harcourt International Airport Management and restaurants/canteen operators and theirallies over relocation has been brought under control, as the operators have commenced relocation to their structures at the new site.
Recall that there had been serious feud over a directive by the Manager of the airport, Mr. Michael Area, for food vendors and their allies to relocate to the new site.
They insisted that the new site was too distant and hence, would negatively affect patronage from customers, with possible loss.
They further also insisted that it wouldcost them much money to put up another structure, given the economic situation in the country, since the airport management did not build any structure for them, apart from providing the empty land they have to also pay for.
The situation had led to flexing of muscles, which made the Airport Manager to order for sealing of all shops, resulting in scarcity of food, as airport users could not find a place to eat, apart from the only Genesis fast food spot available.
As at last Friday, The Tide observed that most of the food vendors had transferred their structures to the new place, and had started doing business there already.
Meanwhile, customers have started settling down at the new location as they were seen patronising shops for foods and drinks, in spite of the distance.
Few of the remaining structures at the old site, The Tide further gathered, will also be removed as quickly as possible, and the owners are making efforts to get funds for the job to be done.
One of them, Mrs Aka Love explained that she was going to relocate to the new place before the end of March.
Currently, business activities at the old site have come to null, as the place which was usually a beehive of food, drinks and relaxation, has completely winded down.
By: Corlins Walter
Business
MOWCA Strengthens Maritime Crime Prevention
Secretary General of the Maritime Organisation of West and Central Africa (MOWCA), Dr. Paul Adalikwu, has stepped up interaction with the United States Government to lift restrictions placed on some member countries allegedly implicated in illicit shipping activities.
Adalikwu, who led a delegation from the MOWCA Secretariat to the US Embassy in Abidjan for a first leg of the strategic consultation aimed at promoting seamless participation of MOWCA countries in international trade within the global maritime space, reiterated the organisation’s commitment to the best ethical and lawful maritime practices.
Addressing the U.S Ambassador to Côte d’Ivoire, H.E Mrs Jessica Davis Ba, the MOWCA SG stated the organisation’s interest in promoting the International Ship and Port facility Security (ISPS) code which aims at enhancing security of vessels and their ports of call.
He expressed the commitment of MOWCA in promoting environmentally friendly, safe and cost effective shipping without any encumbrance that may limit the economic potential of member countries.
Dr Adalikwu recalled that at the instance of the U.S. Department of State invitation, MOWCA participated in the 2023 Registry Information Sharing Compact (RISC) Conference in Larnaca, Cyprus, on February 28–March 1, 2023, and a virtual meeting held on June 6 2023, with Mrs Jennifer Chalmers, Officer in change of Counterproliferation Initiative.
He recalled The U.S. DOS willingness to support MOWCA’s effort for preventive maritime security through the establishment of the Center for Information and Communication (CINFOCOM) with the aim to ensure a maritime situational awareness domain within MOWCA’s member states’ waters.
He added that MOWCA under his watch is committed to training and retraining of maritime practitioners and experts to enhance the human capital capabilities of member states.
The CINFOCOM will help prevent transnational crimes committed at sea like sanctions evasion by North Korea and other state actors, who exploit poor enforcement due diligence by ship open registries to circumvent United Nations and U.S. trade restrictions.
By: Nkpemenyie Mcdominic, Lagos
Business
Nigeria’s Public Debt Hits N97.3trn – DMO
The Debt Management Office (DMO) has hinted that Nigeria’s public debt increased by 10.7 per cent from N87.87 trillion in the third quarter of last year, to N97.34 trillion as at December 31, 2023.
DMO, in an update data released last Friday, said the increase in the debt stock was largely due to new domestic borrowing by the Federal Government to part finance the deficit in the 2024 Appropriation Act and disbursements by multilateral and bilateral lenders.
The office noted that the N97.3 trillion public debt comprises of domestic debt of N59.12 trillion and external debt of N38.22 trillion. The sum of $3.5 billion was used to service external debt during the review period.
“Nigeria’s Public Debt Stock as at December 31, 2023 was N97.34trillion or $108.229 billion. This amount comprises the domestic and external debt stocks of the Federal Government of Nigeria (FGN), the 36 States Governments, and the Federal Capital Territory (FCT).
“There was an increase of N9.43 trillion over the comparative figure for September, 2023, which was largely due to new domestic borrowing by the FGN to part finance the deficit in the 2024 Appropriation Act and disbursements by multilateral and bilateral lenders.
“At N59.12 trillion, total domestic debt accounted for 61 percent of the total public debt stock, while external debt at N38.22 trillion accounted for the balance of 39 percent.
“Consistent with the debt management strategy, Nigeria’s external debt stock was skewed in favour of loans from multilateral (49.77 percent) and bilateral lenders (14.02 percent) or total of 63.79 percent which are mostly concessional and semi-concessional.
“Whilst the DMO continues to employ best practice in public debt management, the recent and on-going efforts of the fiscal authorities to shore up revenue will support debt sustainability”, DMO stated.
By: Corlins Walter
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