Sugar: FG Gives Investors N2bn Lifeline

The Minister  of In
dustry, Trade  and Investment, Dr. Olusegun Aganga has said that the Federal Government has concluded plans to provide N2 billion Agricultural  and Infrastructure  Support Fund for investors in the sugar industry.
Aganga made this known  in Abuja recently  during the quarterly meeting with the Directors General and Chief Executive Officers  of agencies and parastatals under the ministry.
He said the intervention  fund expected to be disbursed at a single  digit interest rate would serve  as cheap and affordable capital for investors investing in the Backward Integration Programme of the federal government  in the sugar sector.
According to the Minister, the National Sugar Development Council, a parastatal under the ministry would  provide N1 billion from the sugar levy, while the Bank of Agriculture would provide a matching fund of additional N1 billion.
He said the funds would serve as intervention fund to assist investors and farmers who are  investing in the sugar-cane to sugar programme which is part of the Back-ward Integration Programme in the sugar sector.
He noted that the single digit interest rate was part of government’s efforts toward the provision of an enabling environment for Nigerians to take advantage of the FG’s sector specific policies that were aimed at industrialisation and job creation in the country.
He added that the Nigerian Sugar Master Plan which provides the road-map  for 100 per cent local production of sugar had within one year of implementation raised the nation’s profile  by attracting about $ 3 billion pipeline investments into the sector.
The Minister said the Nigerian Industrial  Revolution of the present administration was on course with the inauguration of the  Presidential Advisory Council on NIRP and said that  the council has  been  addressing  bottlenecks issues

Livestock being transported for sale, grazing in Zaria due to the recent curfew in Kaduna State