The cash-strapped Federal Government is banking on funds from the private sector to plug the huge infrastructure gap, estimated at over $300 billion, Udoma Udo-Udoma, minister of budget and national planning, said in Lagos on Tuesday.
“We conducted a finding and arrived at the conclusion that we need to spend three to five percent of our GDP annually on infrastructure, if we really want to develop it,” Udo-Udoma said.
“Government funding cannot provide more than 0.5 percent but there is a big gap that will be filled by the private sector. We have already started that. We have a joint venture agreement with Bonny LNG and we have a project in Apapa (Lagos) with Dangote Group, for the construction of Apapa road,” he said.
Nigeria is looking for funds to build dilapidated roads and bridges and put up light rail systems that will aid movement of goods and persons across the country. The Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission (ICRC) estimates that Africa’s biggest oil producer needs about $3.1 trillion to bridge the infrastructure gap in the next 30 years.
The size of Nigeria’s GDP is estimated at $420bn, meaning the country must spend between $12.6 billion and $21 billion annually, to develop its infrastructure.
According to the minister, government has increased its infrastructure spend to 30 percent in the annual budget, while the expectation of the Economic Recovery and Growth Plan (ERGP) is that Nigeria will grow by 3.5 percent in 2018, 4.5 percent in 2019 and 7 percent in 2020.
“We are making efforts to bring down Nigeria’s ranking in Ease of Doing Business, from 169 to below 100,” he said , stating that there was a consensus at last year’s Nigerian Economic Summit (NES) that the country must increase its productivity and raise the quality of its products.
Udo-Udoma stated that this year’s summit, tagged NES #23, with the theme, ‘Opportunities, Productivity and Employment: Actualising the Economic Recovery and Growth Plan’ is expected to enhance the effective implementation of ERGP and also translate into the improvement in living standards of the citizens.
He said the highlight of this year’s NES, is the Start-Up Pitching Event, which will see eight Nigerian start-ups of not more than three years, make presentations before venture capitalists, who will eventually support them.
“What we are trying to do is to support innovation and ensure that young Nigerians with innovative ideas are supported,” the minister stated.
He said the 2017 edition of NES is structured into five key thematic pillars. One is ‘Think Nigeria’, which seeks to identify proactive steps required for building a local content in the economy. The second pillar will deal with ‘Skills, Competencies and Capacity’, which will focus on the linkages between economic opportunities, productivity, skills and competencies, as well as the right policies that can deliver in core areas.
Pillar 3, tagged ‘Access to Capital’, is concerned with how Nigerians can create and explore strategic investment options, frameworks, models and business cases for unlocking the type of capital that creates opportunities and jobs for Nigerians.
The fourth pillar will deal with legislation, while the fifth will focus on economic inclusion, especially tangible actions and collaborative efforts required to deepen inclusion across the country to unlock opportunities at all levels of the country.
Wonu Adetayo, director of policy commissions at NESG, said Nigeria’s slight growth last quarter, which hauled it out of recession, is a positive development for the economy and business.
ODINAKA ANUDU
