Manufacturing needs to contribute 20% of Nigeria’s potential $1 trillion economy – experts

Experts want Nigeria’s manufacturing sector to contribute at least 20 percent to Nigeria’s gross domestic product (GDP), insisting that the country can only be counted among the giants if output in its economy reaches up to $1 trillion.

They say there is a need for constant engagement between the public and the private sector the economy. They argue that this is the only way the government can properly understand the needs, requirement and enablers of the manufacturing sector so as to provide the environment in which the sector can thrive.

Asue Ighodalo, chairman of Sterling bank, while speaking at the inaugural conference of the Association of Company Secretaries and Legal Advisers in the manufacturing sector (ACSLA), said that a country that plans to settle comfortably in the first world must have a GDP tending towards one trillion dollars with at least 20 per cent contribution from the manufacturing sector.

“A GDP contribution of the manufacturing sector of less than nine per cent is totally unacceptable. Before we tackle government, what have we done? I believe that if all our companies are well governed, you comply and provide the financial statements that are reliable, and then you can engage government,” Ighodalo said.

He called on the government and its agencies to encourage export by reducing the bottlenecks for obtaining export permit.

“I also believe that in ensuring their companies are properly governed, that’s also a low hanging fruit, so they can start work from those areas,” he said, while speaking on the theme: ‘Setting a new agenda for sustainable economic growth – the imperative of forging a public/private sector engagement’.

Oscar Onyema , chief executive officer of the Nigerian Stock Exchange (NSE), stressed the need to build a viable and legal frame work for the manufacturing sector.

“The benefits the exchange offers the manufacturing sector is global, diverse, nucleus and all encompassing. The exchange is of the opinion that the sustainable economic growth cannot be successfully achieved without a firm handshake between the public and private sector with both sectors leveraging on the financial infrastructure, technology and above all benefits that the exchange provides for the ease and efficiency of doing business in Nigeria and towards the development of the economy in general,” Onyema said through his representative Irene Robinson-Ayanwale, who is the legal adviser and head of the legal department of the Exchange.

Manufacturing contributes just about 9 percent to the Nigeria’s GDP, estimated to have a maximum size of $440 billion.

Muda Yusuf, director-general of the Lagos Chamber of Commerce and Industry (LCCI), observed that since the economy is largely operated by the private sector, there is need for the chamber to be consistent in its advocacy.

He argued that the resources from the budget cannot make any dramatic impact on the problems that need to be addressed.

“Most of the sectors like ICT are almost 90 percent private sector, education too where government is supposed to take a lead is almost taken over by the private sector. Transportation, oil and gas, hospitals, manufacturing, among others, this is another failure of governance,” he said.

“This is to tell you that it is the private sector that is actually driving this economy and therefore if we are the one driving it, we need to ensure that we have the right policies and we have the right institutions, and we can only get that through a very structured engagement with government. We need to strengthen our engagement,” he said.

 

ODINAKA ANUDU