By Henry Uche
The Nigerian Investment Promotion Commission (NIPC) said it tracked $8.41bn worth of Investments from 15 Projects across eight States. The States include: Bayelsa, Lagos, Kano, Nasarawa, Delta, Edo, Bauchi and Akwa Ibom.
At the Q1 NIPC media Parley, the Director, Strategic Communications of NIPC, Emeka Ofor in his presentation said, the sources of the investments into these States are the United kingdom, the United States, India, China, Nigeria and others, while the sectors affected were manufacturing, construction, Mining & Quarrying, Agriculture and Electricity.
The Director stressed that other States in the federation need to wake up with sound Investments ideas to attract both local and International investors to help their States more viable and Independent without federal allocations.
“Material Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) can only be driven by government policies both at State and federal level. There is need for bold and coherent policy changes to deepen economy reform to reverse the decline expected in 2020/ 2021.
“The gaps between announcement and actual investments need to be worked on, and a more proactive all -of government approach to investors’ support accross federal and States’ government is required to convert announcement to actual Investments,”
He cautioned the media against escalating news particularly critical news capable of scaring and driving investors to other climes, saying, “We must not unnecessarily escalate news, let’s try to reduce the tempo because a single reportage may cause damage to to country, investment-wise, so we must be cautious about our reportage,” he added.
In his presentation, the assistant Director, Incentives Administration Division of NIPC, Uchenna Okonkwo, who gave the summary of Pioneer Status Incentive (PSI) for the Q1 2021, said a total of 17 PSI was granted in Q1 2021, comprising a total of Capital Investments worth N99.45bn and a total of 4,026 jobs created with Ogun toping destination while manufacturing tops by sector.
According to Okonkwo, Anambra, FCT, Kano, Lagos, Ogun Oyo and Kwara got NIPC’s PSI approval in the same quater of the year under review, with capital investment worth N3.705.07bn, cumulatively. He called for Concerted effort to resuscitate the economy.
