The Federal Government is planning to introduce scanners at sea ports for easy identification of products in containers and promises not to grant work permits for jobs whose skills are locally available.
Yemi Osinbajo, Nigeria’s vice president, said this on Thursday at Agbara, Ogun State, while commissioning the second and third phases of Beloxxi Industries’ expansion project.
Osinbajo said the newly approved NAP 3.0 would involve NAFDAC, SON, police and other agencies to ease business registrations and remove obstacles to trade.
He said the government was coming up with Port Community System to promote transparency at ports, adding that the new Order 005 mandated processing authorities in Nigeria to give priority to local firms in award of contracts.
He pointed out that the order prohibited granting work permit to import skills that were locally available.
Osinbajo stated that $66 billion worth of investments had been announced so far in the economy in few months, with the stock exchange rallying to its peak, stressing that the government would continue to work with the private sector to achieve key economic objectives.
“Government is determined to provide hard infrastructure such as rail, road and others. We are also providing soft infrastructure in terms of easing the business environment,” he said.
Okechukwu Enalamah, minister of industry, trade and investment, said the government had set up the Industrial Council to help manufacturers proffer solutions to a myriad of challenges, including working together to rehabilitate ailing infrastructure.
“We want to have a dialogue on how to deal with human capital development in industries. If you look at the Economic Recovery and Growth Plan (ERGP), what is at the centre is investing in our people,” Enalamah said.
Beloxxi Industries is one of the largest biscuit makers in Nigeria with a capacity of 40,000 metric tons (MT) per annum, amounting to 28 million cartons.
The biscuit firm in 2016 closed an $80 million deal with a consortium of 8 Miles (London), African Capital Alliance (Nigeria) and KFW DEG Bank (Germany). The investment is raising the company’s capacity from 40,000MT to 80,000MT while the staff strength is over 3,700.
Obi Ezeude,CEO of Beloxxi’s Industries, said the staff strength would hit 6,000 when the third phase of expansion was completed.
Ezeude said access to capital was a major challenge facing manufacturers in the country, adding that with cheap capital, manufacturers would help put up infrastructure that would benefit communities and the country.
“We need to localise the value chain in manufacturing. This has become very difficult for us as we have 71 local suppliers of raw materials. Apart from industrial parks, look at roads in Agbara and Otta axis,” he said.
Abubakar Abba Bello,MD of Nexim Bank, said the bank came in to support Beloxxi from the outset of the business, first for import substitution, and then to facilitate the export of Beloxxi biscuits.
“NEXIM’s contribution is in the region of N1 billion, and as we are talking now, Beloxxi has even paid up the facility and we are having discussions on granting further enhancement and new facilities. That is how good the business is and that is why we will continue to support them.
“Beloxxi is not the only one we have financed but is one of the most successful portfolios, because there is nothing like, yes, product is being done, employment is being created, foreign exchange is being generated and loans are being paid. You can’t ask for anything more as a bank, and you have added value to the economy.”
“Again, we want to see Beloxxi expand to its limits and to start exporting to beyond the region to across Africa and into the larger world, because they are strong enough now to compete in the global market.”
Odinaka Anudu & Hope Moses-Ashike
