FG Spends Over $500m Yearly on Palm Oil Importation

• FG Spends Over $500m Yearly on Palm Oil Importation

Mr. Godwin Emefiele, the Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), on Monday said the Federal Government spends over $500 million on the importation of palm oil yearly.

Emefiele, Who was attending a stakeholders’ meeting on Palm Oil Value Chain in Abuja, said it is sad that the nation is still importing palm oil in spite of huge natural resources in the South-South and South-East regions of the country to farm it.

The governor recalled that in the late ’50s and 60’s that Nigeria was the largest producer of palm oil in the world and also the largest exporter, exporting almost 40 percent of global supply.

According to him, Malaysia and Indonesia are top producers of palm oil now and poor infrastructure has pushed Nigeria to the fifth position.

“Despite placing oil palm in the forex exclusion list, official figures indicate that importation of palm oil had declined by about 40 percent from the peak of 506,000 Metric Tonnes (MTs) in 2014 to 302,000 MTs in 2017.

“This indicates that Nigeria still expends close to 500 million dollars on oil palm importation annually and we are determined to change this narrative.

“This conversation is indeed important as it forms part of our overall strategy to reduce our reliance on crude oil imports, diversify the productive base of our economy, create jobs and conserve our foreign exchange.

“We intend to support improved production of palm oil to meet not only the domestic needs of the market, but to also increase our exports in order to improve our forex earnings,” he said.

In order to achieve CBN’s target of self-sufficient palm oil production, Emefiele said all the South-South and South-East governors and the Federal Government had agreed to provide at least 100,000 hectares each for large scale oil palm farming.

He said Nigeria could reach self-sufficiency in palm oil between 2022 and 2024 and ultimately overtake Thailand and Columbia to become the third largest producer over the next few years.

“As part of our Anchor Borrowers Program (ABP) and Commercial Agriculture Credit Scheme (CACS), the CBN will work with large corporate stakeholders and small holder farmers to ensure availability of quality seeds for this year’s planting season.

“We will also ensure the availability of agro-chemicals in order to enable improved cultivation of palm oil.

“We will also work to encourage viable off taker agreements between farmers and large-scale palm producing companies.

“Loans will be granted through our ABP and CACS programs at no more than 9 per cent per annum to identified core borrowers,” he said.