Expert seeks economic diversification through manufacturing, agric

A strategic diversification of the economy, with focus on manufacturing and agriculture, holds the ace in salvaging the nation’s economy from the pangs of oil price volatility and naira devaluation, the Group Executive Director of Dangote Group, Devakumar Edwin has said.

Edwin, in a statement made available to The Guardian, pointed out that Nigeria has left its economic fortunes to the vagaries of the international market forces through excessive importation, saying it was high time private investors latched in on this situation and help the government revamp the manufacturing and agricultural sectors.

He disclosed that the realization of this fact prompted the Alhaji Aliko Dangote led conglomerate to make a huge investment in agriculture and manufacturing, by delving into sugar and rice cultivation; fertilizer production; oil and gas refinery; as well as petrochemicals.

“And these are the sectors with huge potentials for employment generation which the country is in dire need of now.

“For instance, in our sugar business, Savannah Sugar Company, apart from the direct employment of 4,000 people, we also engage almost 20,000 people during cultivation and harvesting and there is a farm where we have about than 10,000 hectares and the cultivation is going on today, employing another 10,000 people and today, we are talking about 200,000 hectares of land.

Indeed, Savannah plant has almost 200,000 hectares of land, producing 20 million tonnes of cane for the production of two million tonnes of sugar.