PRESIDENT Goodluck Jonathan yesterday attributed the delay of his administration in the setting up of an economic team to the need to create a conducive environment and tackle the erratic supply of electricity that would boost the general economy.

Besides, as the volume of trade between Nigeria and Canada hits  $2 billion, the Canadian High Commissioner to Nigeria Chris Cooter has spoken of the urgent need for foreign direct investments in Nigeria’s mining sector to rejuvenate the economy and help the Federal Government to meet the Millennium Development Goals in 2015.

Jonathan spoke at the official commissioning of May & Baker PharmaCentre at Ota in Ogun State.  He endorsed plans by May & Baker to boost PharmaCentre to meet the World Health Organisation (WHO) pre-qualification, attract patronage from international agencies and save billions of dollars spent annually in procuring drugs and vaccines from foreign companies.

Plans by the Federal Government and May & Baker to build a human vaccine plant, which would save the country $1billion annually was also unveiled at the event.

Jonathan said: “I am quite happy today that we are celebrating the success of May & Baker. When you are producing locally you are helping in fighting fake drugs, you are adding to the economy.   That is why I took this as my first official visit outside Abuja since my inauguration. I came to see part of the process that will transform this country. Government will continue to protect our local industry. We cannot talk about Vision 20: 2020 if we import most of our materials.

“For us we must manufacture most of our needs. We will create conducive environment by tackling the power sector. That is why we are taking time to create the economic team because we must protect our local industry. Nigeria will no longer be a dumping ground for all sorts of things. Government will really take stronger steps this time to help the growth of our local industry. We know the private sector must play a key role. I had a meeting with the private sector after my inauguration.

“We might have to take certain decisions that might not be pleasant to the people at first. The Uganda example is one of such, especially how the government supported the private sector and today a Ugandan company is the only pharmaceutical company in sub-Saharan Africa pre-qualified by the WHO and therefore enjoys the patronage of the international community.

“Nigeria will no longer have to be a sleeping giant. We must wake up and if we must, we must begin to do things differently. The next four years we will work with you to make sure that most of these issues irritating the environment are addressed. I call on others to emulate May & Baker to invest in this country. Government will prefer to give waivers to companies, which will manufacture in Nigeria. We promise to keep faith and we need a strong economy.”

In his opening remarks, the Chairman of May & Baker, Gen. T. Y. Danjuma said: “We need to get global certification especially the WHO pre-qualification. We have started, which we expect to be a tedious task. This has caused us to raise production and cost of drugs. This makes it non- sustainable without the patronage of government. May & Baker needs government’s support to upgrade.

“We entered into a joint agreement with the Federal Government in 2005 for local production of human vaccines. We believe so much in this and we are constructing a state of the art vaccine facility near this PharmaCentre. This kind does not exist anywhere in the West African region. This project will save government $1 billion in foreign exchange annually spent on vaccines.”

The Director-General of the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC), Dr. Paul Orhii, said PharmaCentre had really been constructed to meet WHO and other global regulatory agencies’ specifications. Orhii said the factory had the potential to reduce the incidence of adulteration of medicines, and would be able to offer good employment opportunities as well as give grants to universities.

The Managing Director, May & Baker, Mr. Nnamdi Okafor, said PharmaCentre was designed as an ultra-modern plant, built with modern facilities to meet the standards of the WHO, United States Food and Drug Administration (USFDA) and other globally recognized regulatory bodies. The plant has a capacity to produce over 4.5 million tablets and 37.5 million bottles of liquid preparation annually. May & Baker Nigeria Plc, till date has committed about N4 billion to this project with a substantial part of this coming from bank financing and shareholders fund.

The Canadian High Commissioner, Cooter, told The Guardian in Abuja at the weekend that his country would need the help of Nigerians to make valuable input into the capacity development scheme which his country was planning in Nigeria with the aim of creating employment for the nation’s teaming population.

Mining constitutes a significant chunk of Canada’s $1.6 trillion economy, raking in $66 billion in export. The envoy wants Nigeria to derive similar benefits from a somewhat neglected sector. Nigeria recently became the largest trading partner of Canada in sub-Saharan Africa.

Suggesting that Nigeria’s somewhat neglect of its once thriving mining sector is worrisome to the development partners, Cooter said: “…Today, we are up there… So, it’s (earnings from mining) a significant part of our economy, but we have 350 Canadian owned mines elsewhere in the world; many of those mines are very large, one is a $2 billion investment. So, we hope that we can find some investors here, so that we can help develop the mining sector but that’s an area that we are very prominent elsewhere in Africa and not yet prominent here in Nigeria. Yet Nigeria needs to develop its mining sector…All across, many countries and not just in Africa but you know, around the world; Angola, everywhere.   We are very active, very prominent in all kinds of conditions, with all kinds of solid minerals. We should co-operate to develop Nigeria’s solid minerals sector. Nigeria has to be helped to meet the Millennium Development Goals. ”

Dwelling on Canada’s involvement in mining on the continent, he continued: “We are involved in Africa but we are conspicuous by our absence here in Nigeria.  There has been some interest; your Minister of Mines and Solid Minerals went to Canada a few weeks ago and we are hopeful that the kind of reforms that are being put in place now, that have been discussed recently by the World Bank and others, will begin to attract interest from Canada. Canada is one of the top mining countries in the world; we have about 350 mines, outside our own country, the mining sector is about  $66 billion worth of exports, for us that’s huge.”

-Guardian

Posted by admin on Jun 27 2011. Filed under Latest Politics. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry