SAYS IT IS INCENTIVIZING AGRI-BUSINESS INVESTMENTS
By Vincess Okushi
The Minister of Foreign Affairs, Ambassador Yusuf Tuggar has assured the international community of the present administration’s commitment to achieving food security, stressing that it is top on President Tinubu’s eight-point agenda to revitalize the nation’s economic structures.
He stated this during a high-level dialogue session at the US-Africa Business Summit on the theme; “From Food Security to Thriving Agribusiness: The Case for a U.S.-Africa Strategic Agribusiness Partnership, in Dallas, Texas, on May 7, 2024.
Tuggar highlights the commitment to fighting corruption, poverty, growth, job creation, access to capital, inclusivity, and the rule of law and harped on the government’s focus on planting materials and all-year-round farming as well as establishing agro-processing zones in the country.
The minister also noted that the major challenge facing the country’s food security is power, adding that efforts are in place to alleviate its impacts on the economy.
President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has signed the 2023 Electricity Act deregulating electricity generation, transmission, and distribution. Nigeria has empowered states, individuals and corporations to generate, transmit, and distribute power. Nigeria sits on 209 trillion cubic feet of gas and we consider gas to be a transition resource to be utilized to tackle our energy challenges. At the moment, we are expanding the oil and gas pipeline Network, the South-North AKK Project, the East-West/Ob/Ob 3 Gas Pipeline Project, and many more. We are also expanding captive or embedded, solar off-grid, power supply and domestication of photovoltaic panel production, I urge you to have a look at NASENI, as well as Sun Africa, which has $2.4 billion U.S funding.
He, therefore, appealed to potential investors in the agriculture value chain seeking land investment in the sector to consider Nigeria as it is keen on attracting direct foreign investment to facilitate the economic growth and development of the country.
the Nigerian Constitution is designed to protect citizens from being disenfranchised by land grabbers, there is a simple but necessary documentation process to protect everyone.