NNPC picks Benue for $300m agro-energy project
The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) is to establish an energy renewable plant in Benue State using agricultural products as part of efforts by the Federal Government to diversify the nation’s economy.
The corporation’s Group General Manager in charge of Renewable Energy Division, Rabiu Suleiman, dropped the hint yesterday during a courtesy call on Benue State Governor, Samuel Ortom, in Makurdi.
He said the project, which is to gulp about $300 million, would be financed through a joint venture with foreign partners.
Suleiman further revealed that the corporation had already secured technical partners.
He noted that the decision to diversify energy generation from existing sources to agricultural products was conceived by the Federal Government in 2005 and has since been in the pipeline.
Suleiman commended the Benue State government for providing 20,000 hectares of land for the project’s take-off, assuring that its equity share in the project.
According to the NNPC chief, the plant, when completed, would boost economic growth and create employment for the people of the state, even as the land would be used for the cultivation of sugarcane, cassava, and palm kernel from where ethanol would be extracted as a renewable energy source.
While also disclosing that the Federal Government had discovered crude oil in the Chad and Benue valley, Suleiman noted that seven other states have been tipped for this renewable energy project.
He stressed that the success of the Benue plant would determine the take-off of the others.
In his remarks, Governor Ortom assured the NNPC delegation that his administration would provide adequate security to both the expatriate and Nigerian workers engaged in the plant.
He commended President Muhammadu Buhari for considering the state for the pilot project.
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1 Comments
I thought we once had a structured and active palm produce industry located in the South South and South Eastern zones of the country, though they are now on the verge of collapse because they are being run by civil servants.
Considering the long gestation period it takes to grow and begin to harvest palm kernels, does it not make better sense to first locate such production outfits for palm kernel to ethanol around those places where the trees already are in existence?
Another thing that is baffling to me is, every Nigerian government thinks erroneously that enterprises such as this should be established by government alone, instead of encouraging the private sector of the economy to pioneer the industry by providing the necessary environment that could encourage that sector to invest in the industry. This attitude is one of the reasons behind the recurring incidents of corruption in the public sector we fight against today.
When we allow government to set up an enterprise with public funds and then appoint civil servants to run it who, by default are less inclined to perform as “government money is nobody’s money”, and without a private sector-like board to breathe down their necks, we are providing the grounds for corruption to breed. As usual, should such an enterprise totter, the general accepted custom would be for government to move on and invest yet again in another enterprise. At best, government is forced to contemplate selling off the failed enterprise cheaply by privatising it. Does that not prove those people right who make a case for the need for government to leave business to business men?
We will review and take appropriate action.