Buhari, Presidency Excite As Jonathan's Super Minister Sets To Save RECESSED Nigerian Economy With $9 million

At a time when President Muhammadu Buhari, is seeking to diversify the nation’s economy to Agriculture, a ‘Super Minister’, who served under the former President, Goodluck Jonathan administration, has indicated interest to assist in the process.

The President of the African Development Bank, AFDB, and former Minister of Agriculture, Dr. Akinwummi Adesina, ‎who made this known on Monday, August 8, in a statement issued and published on the website of the AFDB, said ‎the bank has ‎approved a whopping sum of $9 million equity investment, through the Fund for Agricultural Finance in Nigeria, FAFIN, in a bid to provide expansion capital to agricultural small and medium-sized enterprises, SMEs, in the country.

Adesina, noted that ‎FAFIN is a first-generation private equity fund, that provides financial capacity-building and technical assistance to commercially viable SMEs in the Nigerian agribusiness sector.

According to him, FAFIN, operates by using a unique value chain-centric approach, a combination of equity, quasi-equity, and convertible loan instruments, to provide loans for SME’s.

‎Adesina, noted that FAFIN would be implemented through ‎a bifocal lens, consisting of the twin objectives of competitive financial returns, and measurable positive social impact.‎

‎The Fund is jointly sponsored by the German KfW Development Bank, and the Government of Nigeria, through the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, FMARD.

‎The overall objective of the project, is expected to deliver strong development outcomes from household benefits and employment, through the creation of a large number of jobs, and the provision of certain agricultural products.

‎“The project’s contribution to inclusive growth, is expected to be significant, given the large number of jobs to be created, and out-growers to be reached at the level of sub-projects,’’ the statement said.

‎The ‎Fund’s primary focus will be on SMEs across the agricultural value chain, with crop value chain and geographic diversification.

‎It aims at fixing broken value chains to increase efficiency, reduce post-harvest losses, and increase smallholder farmer incomes and SME agribusiness profitability.

‎The Investment instruments will be primarily quasi-equity (convertible bonds, preference shares and structured royalties), and direct equity.

The ticket size ranges from $500, 000 to $5 million.

‎The Fund is aligned with the Bank’s ten-year strategy, focusing on inclusive growth, strengthening agriculture and food security, and access to local SME finance.

‎According to Adesina, the whole project is ‎in line with the bank’s strategy for Agricultural Transformation in Africa, from 2016-2025, and Strategy on Jobs for Youth in Africa, from 2016-2025.‎

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APRIL FOOOOL! But Power Generation, Indeed, Dropped To ZERO Megawatts

In what the authorities attributed to system failure, Nigeria’s grid system totally collapsed yesterday, leaving millions of citizens in utter darkness.

Although, Power, Works and Housing Minister, Babatunde Fashola said it was because “four turbines stopped working,” the Transmission Company of Nigeria (TCN) did not state any reason on its website.

Statistics obtained by Daily Sun from its website indicated that power allocation to all distribution companies across the country dropped to 0 Megawatts (MW).

This happened when President, Muhammadu Buhari was in far away United States of America (USA) to press that the country be allowed to exploit its nuclear energy resources to boost power infrastructure.

Load statistics from the System Operator website indicated that as at 12.58.00 hours yesterday, Ikeja Disco, Ibadan, Abuja, Port Harcourt, Benin, Jos, Kaduna,Yola, Eko and Enugu, got zero allocation.

Daily Sun investigation across Lagos indicated that many areas were in darkness as at 9.20pm and the situation was same for Ogun, Ibadan, Benin, Ilorin and Lokoja.

Early this week, Abuja Chamber of Commerce and Industry (ACCI) said businesses, especially MSME’s have lost over N30 billion through the unavailability of energy supply.

Speaking in the same vein, Mr. Nnamdi Okafor, Managing Director of May & Baker (M&B) Plc lamented that the the cost of doing business in the country is very high. “To provide power, we spend about N350 million every year; just to provide electricity for our plants to run. In advanced countries, even in some other developing countries, they are the things you take for granted. As I speak to you, I am not sure I will run my factory because I was not able to access foreign exchange to buy raw materials we need.  It is as bad as that.”

General Secretary of National Union of Textile Garment and Tailoring Workers of Nigeria (NUTGTW‎N), Issa Aremu said the situation would further worsen Nigeria’s industrial situation as it would make Nigeria’s products less competitive. “The situation had always been bad, but, this time around, it would further impoverish Nigerian workers whose income would be worsen further. There is no doubt our government needs to put an end to all these crises,” he said.

Aremu insisted that ‎it is high time the Minister of Power, Housing and Works, Babatunde Raji Fashola, address Nigerians on the reasons why the whole country have been in darkness for almost two weeks with no visible solution in sight.

He noted that the Power Minister was always ready to speak for the Gencos and Discos on why they should increase electricity bills, but has never, for a day since he took up appointment, addressed Nigerians on his plan to improve electricity.

Culled from The Sun Newspaper