CBN, Ondo to set up largest Egg powder plant in Africa, Middle-East

Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Godwin Emefiele and the Ondo State Governor, Rotimi Akeredolu, SAN, will jointly inaugurate a
new Egg Powder Plant in Emure-Ile, near Owo, Ondo State that could help the largest African nation meet its huge egg demand and venture into export.

The project comes through a Public Private Partnership (PPP) arrangement between the Ondo State Government and Greenfield Assets Limited soon.

According to the CBN, Greenfield Assets Limited, has already commenced the utilization of 150 Hectares of land for the establishment of 10 million broilers per annum farm with a 4,000 birds per hour meat processing plant; a 600,000 layers farm for the production 100 million eggs per annum; two 20 tons per hour Feed-mill and a 500,000 Eggs per day Egg Powder Plant.

Isaac Okorafor, CBN Acting Director, Corporate Communications disclosing this in Abuja on Tuesday said the plant would create about 25,000 jobs, earn the country over $1 billion in foreign exchange savings and boost increased incomes for poultry farmers in Nigeria.

The Minister of Agriculture and Rural Development, Audu Ogbeh, had in January announced talks with the CBN to launch a N10billion fund for the National Egg Production Scheme (NEPRO) in the country.

With the scheme, the government targets to achieve a daily production of 50million eggs over the next five years for local consumption,
export and processing into egg powder for use in confectionaries and pharmaceuticals.

Authorities also hope the programme could create up to one million jobs nationwide through egg production, processing and marketing.
Paul Obanua, the chief executive officer of Greenfield Asset Limited, who mobilized the investors, put the estimated value of the Nigerian poultry industry at ₦ 300 billion ($850 million), which he said comprised of approximately 220 million birds that produced over 770,000 MT of eggs and 340,000 MT of poultry meat in 2017.

According to Agriculture Nigeria, Food processing industries in West Africa spend over USD2 billion annually in imports of egg and milk
powder products. Nigeria is said to spend USD1billion annually in Egg Powder imports alone.

The project with a capital requirement of NGN 28,369,276,360 to be invested in capital equipment and working capital, will see Big Dutchman International providing technical and operational management of the project. Other parties to the project are Marel Food Processing Company BV, a leading global provider of advanced processing systems and services to the Poultry, Meat and Fish industries, and Actini SAS.

 

Onyinye Nwachukwu, Abuja