Nigeria’s Minister of Agriculture, Audu Ogbeh (photo), said the government can no longer afford the high importation bill on fish. According to the official, a rising population, scarcity of foreign exchange income and the naira’s depreciation spurred this decision. Ogbeh said Nigeria spends $700 million on fish imports each year to overcome the deficit between demand (3.32mln Mt/y) and...

The Nigerian Debt Management Office (DMO) has revealed that the country’s total debt at the end of 2016 was $57.39 billion. Speaking while defending the agency’s 2017 budget before the Senate Committee on Local and Foreign Debts, the Director-General of DMO, Abraham Nwankwo (photo), said foreign debts stood at $11.41 billion, while domestic debt amounted to $45.98 billion....

A Nigerian Federal High Court has issued an order for the permanent forfeiture of a N34 billion ($109million) associated to former Minister of Petroleum Resources, Diezani Allison-Madueke (photo). The judge of the High Court, Justice Muslim Hassan, gave the order on Thursday while passing judgement on a suit filed by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), demanding for the...

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has allocated $2.83bn over the last two months to the manufacturing and other sectors to import raw materials and spare parts to boost production capacity. This was revealed by the Acting Director, Corporate Communications Department, CBN, Isaac Okorafor. He explained that out of the amount disbursed, $609m and $228m were released in December...

The World Bank has disclosed that Nigeria would need about $140 billion by 2030 in order to take effective action on climate change. Benoit Bosquet, the Practice Manager Africa, Environment & Natural Resources at the World Bank disclosed this during his presentation at the ongoing workshop on Climate Change Knowledge Immersion in Kaduna State. He said that in order for the country to...

Nigeria’s Federal Executive Council (FEC) has approved the award of 12 road construction contracts worth N126 billion ($404million). “The headline figures are in the region of about 126 billion naira. But I think that is not the story, the story really is what the contracts do to the economy. They restore confidence back to the construction industry. Contractors who have been owed for two...

The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) revealed that Nigeria’s annual inflation increased to 18.72% in January 2017 from the 18.55% recorded in December 2016. According to the statistics office, the rise was mainly spurred by an increase in prices of food, transport and electricity. In regards to food prices, “the Food Index increased to 17.82% (year-on-year) in January 2017, up by 0.43...

Nigeria’s crude oil export to India dropped by 54% in January due to several attacks on the Trans Forcados Pipeline. The Trans Forcados Pipeline, which is the major trunk line within the Forcados oil pipeline system, has been shut since last year, making the South Asian country turn to Angola. However, Austin Avuru, the Chief Executive Officer of Seplat Petroleum Development Company Plc, a...

US firm Cargill aims to become one of the major actors of the Egyptian agro-food industry. After announcing in 2015 a $100 million investment, the trader aims to bring this amount up to $300 million. This was revealed by Tarek Kabil, Egypt’s minister of industry and trade. Through this move, the group will be able to expand its portfolio of activities especially in terms of transport...

The government of Rwanda just dropped a biogas production project worth $35 million. Officials of the National Industrial Research and Development Agency (NIRDA) told Rwanda Today that the decision was taken due to the lack of viability of the project. According to Joseph Mungarurire, director general of NIRDA, challenges met to collect raw materials and raise funds necessary to its...