Okolo statedthis while speaking with newsmen last Thursday at the Raw Materials Research and Development Council (RMRDC) Techno-expo and Silver Jubilee.
He said that the country lost N1 trillion to the importation of between 80 per cent and 90 per cent industrial raw materials needed in the manufacturing and construction sectors of the economy.
Okolo said that the problem was not the non-availability of raw materials locally, but the inability of Nigerians to transform available natural resources to utilisable forms.
He urged the government and the organised private sector, to look inward and study the road map to industrial development as put together by the RMRDC in the past 25 years.
”If the industrial sector continues to depend on imported raw materials without investing in local raw materials development and utilisation, industrial development will remain a mirage,” Okolo said.
Okolo said that for Nigerian economy to be competitive at the global level, efforts must be made to produce goods and services with global perspectives, targeting global competitiveness.
He said: ”We must spare no effort to look inward to tap, develop and utilise the locally available raw materials.
”Government must make concert effort to address the critical issues of transparency, responsible governance, power generation, public private partnership, infrastructure and security.”
Customs boss sets up c’tte to revive Lilypond Command.
Comptroller-General of the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS), Alhaji Dikko Inde Abdullahi, has set up a committee to revive activities at the Lilypond Area Command, Ijora, Lagos.
Activities at the terminal have been at their lowest ebb since last year.
Zonal Coordinator in charge of Zone ‘A’ and Chairman of the Committee, Assistant Comptroller-General Victor Gbemudu, in chat with SHIPS & PORTS DAILY said that the committee has had its maiden meeting and will soon present its report to the Customs boss.
Gbemudu stated that the call by a group of agents demanding for the merger of Lilypond and Apapa command is impossible as according to him, Lilypond was created as an autonomous command.
Members of the committee, apart from Gbemudu, include Customs Area Controller (CAC) of the Lilypond Command, Comptroller Willy Egbudin; and representatives of Lilypond Container Terminal and APM Terminals, among others.
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