‘Nigeria earned N52.75b from solid minerals in 2017’

Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (NEITI) has revealed that the solid minerals sector contributed N52.75 billion to the federation account in 2017.

NEITI in its latest report on Solid Mineral Sector released in Abuja yesterday added that the amount was a 21 per cent increase on the N43.22 billion the sector contributed in 2016.

The report followed an audit on independent reconciliation of company payments and government receipts in the sector.Amedu Onekpe & Co, an indigenous accounting and auditing firm, conducted the 2017 solid minerals audit for NEITI.

“From the sector’s total revenue contribution of N52.75 billion, payments to the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS) accounted for N49.162 billion, which is about 93 per cent of the total revenue realised during the period under review.“Payments to the Mines Inspectorate Department (MID) and Mining Cadastre Office (MCO) amounted to N1.59 billion and N2.08 billion or about three and four per cent respectively of the total revenue from the sector.

“Except for revenue from MID, there was significant increase in revenue from all other streams in 2017,” it added.NEITI also said that about 16.3 million metric tonnes of solid minerals valued at $30 million was exported from Nigeria in 2017.It disclosed this in its latest report on independent reconciliation of company payments and government receipts audit in the solid mineral released in Abuja yesterday.

“The country’s total export was about ₦13.6 trillion, with solid minerals contributing N77.23 billion or 0.57 per cent of total export in 2017.”The report noted that a trend analysis showed that in 2015, solid minerals export was N1.94 billion.This, it said, witnessed a geometric leap to N11.16 billion in 2016 and an equally impressive figure of N77.2 billion in 2017.

“The major destination of Nigeria’s export during the year under review is China, which accounted for 68 per cent of the total export value during the year,” it said.According to the report, other destinations are Malaysia, Vietnam and India.However, the report observed that export data received from the Nigerian Customs Service (NCS) include minerals that were not captured in the production data provided by the MID, as well as inconsistency in FOB value of minerals.