FG Told To Ban Import Of Locally Sourceable Raw Materials

EKO HOT BLOG reports that Dr. Abdullahi Aliyu, former Director General/CEO of the Raw Materials Research and Development Council (RMRDC), has urged the government to enforce a ban on the importation of raw materials that are readily available locally.

This call comes as the Kaduna Chamber of Commerce, Industry, Mines, and Agriculture (KADCIMMA) and the RMRDC emphasize the crucial importance of maximizing local content in the raw material value chain across all 36 states and the FCT.

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This proactive measure is essential for fostering sustainable economic growth by ensuring optimal utilization of raw material resources at the state level. It underscores the imperative to address the availability of industrial raw materials within Nigeria’s manufacturing sector, thereby strengthening the local content drive and enhancing the overall economy.

This is as the sectoral group produced a document to know the availability of industrial raw material resources across the 36 states in the country and the FCT with the view of strengthening local content drive to leverage the aspirations and growth of the industrial sector.

The RMRDC produced a document titled, Raw Material Resources in Nigeria on Local Government Basis. The document is attached as an annexure which summarised the two categories of raw material resources in various establishments in the manufacturing sector namely the agro-based raw materials and the mineral based raw materials.
The sector, however, looked at the performances of the manufacturing sector from the 1980s to Date and then concluded with suggestions on the way forward for Nigeria to attain sustainability and economic recovery.

Speaking at the 45th Kaduna International Trade Fair Seminar with the theme, ‘’Sustainable Economic Recovery through Deepening of Local Content Value Chain, Aliyu said that Nigeria is a country blessed with abundant human and material resources, but most of them are not yet being effectively and economically harnessed for the development of this country and hence the relevance of today’s seminar theme.

He noted that the Manufacturing Sector in Nigeria is in a very serious crisis, with industries closing down at alarming rates, resulting in the loss of jobs and employment opportunities.

According to the RMRDC Techno-Economic Survey reports, between 1980s and 2020, more than 2,000 major industries and over 10,000 small-scale industries have closed down in Nigeria due to the poor or harsh economic conditions in the country.

For those industries that managed to survive, the current average capacity utilisation of these industries ranged between 10 per cent and 20 per cent only.

“Industrially, the Manufacturing Sector in Nigeria is decaying and the situation is getting more critical and uglier. The government needs to move urgently to address the situation through a number of strategies.”
Aliyu explained that raw materials that include: gypsum, limestone, marble, silica sand, kaolin, ball clay, bentonite, crushed rocks and barite should be stopped from importing into the country, saying that the federal government should support and encourage the private sector to invest in and develop these resources.

He recommended that “for those raw materials that can be partially sourced locally, efforts should be made by the federal government and the private sector to step up the level of development and production. Such raw materials include: diatomite, zircon sand, sulphur, phosphate, potash salt, fluorite, bauxite and sillimanite.”