The Acting President, who spoke today, Thursday, at the formal release ceremony to discharge Indorama Eleme Petrochemicals Limited (IEPL), from the monitoring the programme of the Bureau of Public Enterprises (BPE) in Port Harcourt, Rivers State capital, acknowledged that the programme represents one of the success stories of the Federal Government’s privatization programme.
Professor Osinbajo, who also commissioned the Indorama Eleme Fertilizer and Petrochemicals Plant, admitted that it is impossible for government to ever be able to provide all the capital needed to invest in infrastructure, or to catalyze economic activity.
According to him, the best that the government can do is acting as a catalyst and an enabler, supporting private capital to achieve maximum impact in an economy that so desperately needs all the investment it can get.
“What Indorama is accomplishing today is very much in line with President Buhari’s vision for a country that produces what it consumes and grows what it eats. If you had to sum up our vision for the Nigerian economy in a few words, these would suffice. Grow what we eat, produce what we consume.
“At the end of last year, the President launched a Presidential Fertilizer Initiative, to ensure the availability of cheaper fertilizer to our farmers, to support what we’re doing in agriculture, in the production of rice and wheat and other staples.
“That Fertilizer Initiative, now well underway, has created significant economic opportunities for companies like the IEPL. I have been informed that Indorama will this year alone supply about 360,000 MT of Urea to Fertilizer blenders, who will in turn produce NPK fertilizer for the benefit of farmers across the country. This is the kind of economic progress we’re after, in which every unlocked opportunity proceeds to unlock several others, across multiple sectors of the economy.
“In equally exciting news, Indorama has now pushed ahead deeper into the value chain by going into fertilizer production. Their Fertilizer plant, commissioned today, is, I am told, is one of the largest in the world, designed to produce 1.5 mts of Urea fertilizer per annum, for the domestic and foreign markets.
“We will continue to support Indorama Eleme Petrochemicals Limited expansion ambitions. Our commitment to the privatization programme is equally assured, and we will continue to do everything to support investors to maximize the potential of their assets.
“It is worthy of note that Indorama Eleme is not just a privatization success it also has the important component of part community ownership so that the local community and workers are stakeholders in this enterprise. This is good practice and a model for ownership of natural resource based industries in the future.” [myad]
