Niger Government partners Nigeria Sugar Council to Revive Sugar Industry in the country.

 Niger Foods has entered into partner with the Nigeria Sugar Development Council to revive the two point five billion dollars Nigeria Sugar Industry in the country.

This is with a view to leverage on the State of Emergency on Food Security declared by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to achieve the desired benefits.

Special Adviser to the Niger State Governor on Digital Media and Strategy, Abdulbaqy Usman Ebbo stated this on his social media handle X.

According to him the initiatives is also another bold step to promote food Security and rural Industrialization of Nigeria which will boost agricultural production and enhanced the nations economy.

Abdulbaqy Usman Ebbo noted that during a side event of the G20 Summit in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Niger Food signed a deal with Uttam Sucrotech (a consortium composed of leading Brazil and India Sugar Value Chain experts) to develop two hundred and fifty thousand  Hectares of Sugarcane fields and six Sugar/Ethanol plants in Niger State in the next  three years. 

He said the Niger Farms project which will harness about ninety thousand hectares of land on the shoulder of the recently flagged off Sokoto – Lagos Super Highway will produce two point five metric tones of Sugar, two hundred and fifty million litres of Ethanol, and generate three hundred Megawatts of Electricity. 

Abdulbaqy Ebbo further explained that the project will also create one hundred thousand direct Jobs, and two hundred and fifty indirect Jobs aside from the projected seven hundred and fifty thousand Out grower participants.

In his remarks at the event, Minister Of Foreign Affairs Yusuf Tuggar applauded the Niger State Government for its private sector approach to the development of Agriculture through the creation of Niger Foods and also for the strategic choice of the two leading Sugar producers in the world with a specialty for large scale cultivation (Brazil) and structured small scale out-grower program (India). 

Abdulbaqy Ebbo quoted, the Minister of Agriculture and Food Security Abubakar Kyari who expressed the support of the Ministry to Niger State in the quest for Large scale mechanized and integrated Agriculture, however praised the strategic choice of coupling research and innovation to the development of the farms. 

He said the development of the Sugar value chain will give birth to a vibrant livestock industry in Niger State and the mixed cropping of sugar with Soybean will promote and encourage massive foreign exchange earning.

In his speech, Niger state Governor, Governor Mohammed Umar Bago, thanked President Bola Ahmed Tinubu for the unprecedented initiative targeted at propelling the socio economic development of Nigeria.

Ebbo hinted that Governor Bago said the component that Super Highways which passed through Niger State will open ninety thousand hectares of arable land which will be part of the field to be used in the Sugar project.

It could be recalled that Nigeria, Brazil, and India were in the 1960s developing the sugarcane culture, according to the Executive Secretary of the Nigeria Sugar Council, Mr. Kamar Bakrin, the Nigeria Sugar Industry has since stagnated with the area cultivated being less than 20,000 Hectares producing about 540,000 metric tones (about 3% of Nigeria current Sugar demand) compared to Brazil’s and India’s production of 41 million metric tones and 36 million metric tones respectively.

END ALIYU LAWAL.