Ngige Decries Low Productivity, Competitiveness

• Ngige Decries Low Productivity, Competitiveness

The Minister of Labour and Employment, Chris Ngige, has said despite the country‘s huge human and natural resources, it lags behind smaller and less-endowed African countries in productivity and competitiveness.

Ngige stated this at a briefing ahead of the 17th National Productivity Day and National Productivity Order of Merit (NPOM) awards scheduled for Abuja.

The minister said for the country to achieve high productivity and competitiveness, there was the need to bridge the productivity and competitiveness gap.

He said: “So, real competitiveness means the ability to produce goods and services that can compete in the domestic and international markets while promoting and maintaining a high living standard and quality of life for the people.

“Therefore, only nations with organisations that have high levels of productivity will become domestically and globally competitive.

“This has the capacity to exploit existing market opportunities to sustain and expand employment and real income growth in the long term,’’ he said.

He said the government was conscious of the critical place of productivity in the realisation of the change agenda, saying it was against this backdrop that the Federal Government, through the National Policy on Productivity, declared that a day shall be observed as the National Productivity Day yearly.

Ngige said the observance of the day and the conferment of the award was a positive step by the government to institutionalise productivity consciousness and excellence in service among workers and organisations in Nigeria.

He said the award committee was an independent committee that conducted a screening, recommended 15 individuals and five organisations drawn from all sector of the economy.

Ngige said the awardees include: Mrs Winifred Oyo-Ita, Head of Civil Service of the Federation, Mr Sam Ohuabunwa, Dr Abdul Husseni, Farm Crowdy Nigeria Limited and Fresh Direct Nigeria.

Also, National Productivity Centre (NPC) Director-General Kashim Akor said selection of the awardees was done by a committee set up for the purpose of the nomination.