Considering the clear federal government agro policy which has been embraced by every state and private sector investors since the emergence of President Muhammadu Buhari administration, leading industrialist and president of Dangote group, Alhaji Aliko Dangote has professed that “Africa will become the food basket of the world”, very soon.
In his presentation at the headquarters of global law firm, Shearman and Sterling LLC, in New York at the sideline of the 72nd UNGA, he told the high level business leaders and international diplomats invited by the Corporate Council for Africa, that massive agro investments are ongoing across Africa and Nigeria in particular.
Linking his address to the not so favourable dynamics in global oil prices and production challenges, Dangote said, “We should pray that oil prices remain low. This helps wean us off the dependency on revenues from petroleum. We must take oil to be the icing on the cake. We already have the cake.”
Aside, farming, he cited Nigeria’s vast mineral resources and natural gas as sources of economic prosperity and stressed the need to manufacture more goods locally for domestic consumption.
According to him, “five of the 12 million jobs needed in Africa soon must be created in Nigeria.”
Business Hilights recalls that Dangote has diversified his business from cement, sugar, and other household commodities to fertiliser and other processed high-value goods.
Continuing, he said “Technology, of course, helps us a lot and our factories are state of the art with the use of robotics but we shouldn’t be overly tech-oriented to create wealth”.
