March 22, 2022

…Set to transform the agricultural sector

History was made Tuesday as Africa’s largest Urea fertiliser plant was commissioned in Lagos to boost the country’s target of becoming self sufficient in fertiliser production thereby improving food production.

The plant which stands on a 500 hectares of land is poised to be the biggest source of income to the nation.

Speaking at the official commissioning of the 2.5billion dollars plant, Aliko Dangote, Chief executive of the Dangote group, said project is an ambitious development programme geared towards creating more jobs for the teeming youth population in the nation.

“It is an ambitious developmental project which will drastically reduce the level of unemployment and youth restiveness in this country, through the direct and indirect employment,” he said.

He added that the 3mmts is just the first phase of the annual production projection.

“Phase 1 of the plant was delivered at an estimated cost of $2.5billion to produce 3mmtpa of urea. The capacity will later be expanded to produce multi grades of fertiliser to meeting soil, crop and climate specific requirement for the African continent”.

“Our target is to give farmers the power to produce more, as more fertilisers will be made available to them, even as we also become self sufficient in fertizer production.”

“The fertiliser will help Nigeria to retain 125million dollars in import substitution and provide 625 million dollars from exports of products from the fertiliser plant”.

Dangote noted further that the country has very low per hectare usage of fertiliser leading to very poor crop yield and the plant is set to bridge that gap in capacity and production.

“We’re currently exporting to the US, Brazil and some African countries”.

“Our goal is to make fertiliser available in sufficient quantities and quality for our farmers in achieving greater agricultural outputs and to help realise this potential, we are rolling out initiatives that will transform the agriculture sector including services for all small and medium-scale farmers.”

With Nigeria’s population expected to hit over 262 million by 2030 which would lead to huge increase in food consumption, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) governor, Godwin Emefiele said that the country, prior to 2015 imported virtually all its fertiliser products.

“From 7 plants Nigeria can now boast of over 48 active fertiliser blending plants”, Emefiele said.

Those in attendance at the ceremony include: President of Dangote Group, Aliko Dangote; Deputy Secretary General of the United Nations, Mrs. Amina Mohammed; the Vice-Chairman of Channels Media Group, Mrs. Olusola Momoh; Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Godwin Emefiele; as well as former Lagos State Governor, Bola Tinubu.

Others are: President of the Senate, Ahmad Lawan; Speaker of the House of Representatives, Femi Gbajabiamila; Chairman of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum, Kayode Fayemi; as well as members of the forum including Babajide Sanwo-Olu (Lagos), Darius Ishaku (Taraba), and Badaru Abubakar (Jigawa).

Report by Theresa Igata