Nigeria plans to increase its palm oil production 700% over the next eight years to help improve its foreign-exchange earnings that are largely dependent on crude oil exports.
The new policy will boost local production to about five million tons from 600,000 tons a year by investing as much as 180 billion naira ($500 million) beginning this year, the trade and investment ministry said in a report.
“Our policy objectives over an eight-year period (between 2019 and 2027) will see that we locally produce 100% of local crude palm oil demand by 2027, increase revenue from importation via duties and deliver 225,000 full time jobs and at least 450,000 seasonal jobs,” it said.
The new policy also seeks to remove the 75% duty rebate granted on refined palm oil imports and extend a current three-year tax holiday for all producing and processing companies to five years. It will introduce a five-year restriction of crude and refined palm oil importation to large-scale refineries and crushing-plant owners.
Farmers will be given access to loans at 9% per year through a central bank-administered lending to expand cultivation by at least three million hectares.
Presco Plc, the country’s largest producer of palm oil, is driving an expansion plan that expects a 500-ton capacity refinery to begin operating in first quarter of 2020, with an additional increase of its milling capacity from 60 tons an hour to 90 tons an hour by next January, Chief Executive Officer Felix Nwabuko said in a conference call with investors on Thursday.
By 2022, the company expects to push capacity to 210 tons an hour, with an additional 60 tons per hour in milling facilities, he said.
The West African nation’s palm oil imports rose from 302,000 tons in 2017 to 600,000 tons by end of 2018, costing the country as much as $500 million, despite placing the commodity on a forex-exclusion list, central bank figures indicate.
While Nigeria wants to grow quickly in palm oil, it’s still likely to be a small part of a market dominated by Indonesia and Malaysia. The country currently ranks as the world’s fifth-biggest producer in palm oil, accounting for less than 2% of global production, according to data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture.
By Ruth Olurounbi
Bloomberg
Friday, June 14, 2019
Thursday, June 13, 2019
Plastic bottles paying for education in Nigeria
A school in Nigeria is accepting plastic bottles in lieu of school fees from parents. African Clean Up Initiative and WeCyclers are two organisations working with Morit International School in Ajegunle, Lagos, for the project, reports BBC. The Recycle Pay project allows parents to use plastic waste as currency to pay their children's school fees. The twofold positive impact of this scheme? Families save money while reducing plastic pollution and cleaning up the city in the process.
The process for the Recycle Pay project is simple: Parents can bring a bag of plastic waste to a facility where it is weighed. The weight is then converted into a monetary value, which can be deducted from the amount owed as fees to the school. The collected waste is taken away by a recycling company twice a month.
"I struggle to pay for school fees, sometimes I pay half the price and later pay the remaining balance," parent Sherifat Okunowo explained in an interview to BBC. "But with the introduction of this project, the plastic has made it easy for me to pay school fees."
"This project that is going on right now, I think is very, very good," another parent, Jane Enyinnaya, confirms. "It has really reduced the burden on parents."
The school's principal echoes this sentiment. "It has really reduced the burden on parents," he says. "We now collect fees faster-the school wins, the children win, the parents win, everybody wins."
According to My Modern Met, the Ajegunle district in Lagos has three million residents, making it one of the most densely populated slums in the county. The Recycle Pay project has not only helped clean up the area, it has also made access to education easier.
NDTV
The process for the Recycle Pay project is simple: Parents can bring a bag of plastic waste to a facility where it is weighed. The weight is then converted into a monetary value, which can be deducted from the amount owed as fees to the school. The collected waste is taken away by a recycling company twice a month.
"I struggle to pay for school fees, sometimes I pay half the price and later pay the remaining balance," parent Sherifat Okunowo explained in an interview to BBC. "But with the introduction of this project, the plastic has made it easy for me to pay school fees."
"This project that is going on right now, I think is very, very good," another parent, Jane Enyinnaya, confirms. "It has really reduced the burden on parents."
The school's principal echoes this sentiment. "It has really reduced the burden on parents," he says. "We now collect fees faster-the school wins, the children win, the parents win, everybody wins."
According to My Modern Met, the Ajegunle district in Lagos has three million residents, making it one of the most densely populated slums in the county. The Recycle Pay project has not only helped clean up the area, it has also made access to education easier.
NDTV
Nigeria beat S.Korea 2-0 in Women's World Cup
A first half own-goal at the Stade des Alps and a breakaway attack, brilliantly finished by Asisat Oshoala, ensured the Africa champions only their fourth win in eight World Cup finals appearances. It also gives Nigeria a chance to go to the second round for just the second time.
The Koreans, beaten 4-0 by France in the tournament opener last Friday, are all but out of contention after a surprise setback in their second Group A game.
After weathering Korea’s early attacks, Nigeria went ahead just before the half-hour mark when defender Kim Do-yeon miscued an effort to try to clear a long ball through the middle and steered it past her goalkeeper Kim Min-jung, who had come rushing out of her goal and was stranded.
There was a lengthy Video Assistant Referee review to see whether Nigeria’s captain Desire Oparanozie might have brushed the ball with her hand as she headed to the goal but there was no conclusive evidence to rule out the goal.
Korea were pulled back for offside when they found the net in the 58th minute before a Nigerian counter attack saw Oshoala, a three-time African women’s Footballer of the Year, ran half the length of the field, brushed past a defender, rounded the goalkeeper and squeezed the ball home from an almost improbable angle.
She might have scored in similar fashion just two minutes after the 75th minute goal but a heavy first touch saw the opportunity slip away.
Nigeria lost their opening game by 3-0 to Norway in Reims on Saturday.
New York Times
Wednesday, June 12, 2019
Video - Are Nigerians benefiting from democracy
It's 20 years since the end of military rule and return to a civilian presidency. The last few years have been particularly challenging for Africa's most populous country of 200 million. 45 percent of people in Nigeria live in extreme poverty. Economic growth has slowed, unemployment is high and government forces are battling armed groups such as Boko Haram. So what, if any, has been the democratic dividend for Nigerians?
Slum dwellers in Nigeria fight evections with maps and music
When bulldozers entered the Nigerian slum of Njemanze and started tearing down hundreds of waterfront homes, Michael Uwemedimo was there to document the scene with his camera.
The residents soon began directing him, he said, making sure he did not miss any of the destruction in August 2009.
“Film this, film that,” he recalled them saying.
And when the British-Nigerian documentary maker was arrested by security forces, the residents of the slum in the city of Port Harcourt hid his camera and kept it safe until he was released later that day.
“They recognized the camera as an instrument they could use to literally frame what is important to them, to tell their story, to give their perspective,” said Uwemedimo.
According to housing advocates, half of Port Harcourt’s more than 1 million residents live in slums.
Many of those residents live in waterfront areas, on land with prime real-estate value, and have no official housing documentation, noted Isa Sanusi, spokesman for Amnesty International Nigeria.
That makes them especially vulnerable to evictions, he said.
“Generally, Nigerian authorities use forced eviction in the course of urban renewal ... with the land they formerly occupied being developed into luxury real estate,” he explained - although the cleared area in Njemanze remains undeveloped.
Uwemedimo said his experience in Njemanze showed him how desperate the residents were to draw attention to what was happening to them, and he wanted to help.
In 2010, with former journalist Ana Bonaldo, he co-founded the Collaborative Media Advocacy Platform (CMAP), a collective of filmmakers, urban planners, researchers and Port Harcourt residents who use art, music and data collection to mobilize the people impacted by forced evictions.
The group has since grown to more than 40 volunteers.
One of the first things Uwemedimo did with it was take a giant, inflatable mobile cinema on a tour of low-income communities in the city to show them films about forced evictions around the world and in their own neighborhood.
“We found cinema was a good way of gathering people, of animating people, of creating debate,” he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation from his living room, with a computer blasting out songs about evictions.
A spokeswoman for the ministry of urban planning would not comment on specific eviction cases, but said the government had an obligation to take down unsafe or unauthorized buildings.
“The state carries out demolitions when buildings do not follow the approved building plan, or are built illegally or in unauthorized areas,” she said.
“For example where you have high tension cables, building on top of waterways or in unapproved areas - all that can lead to demolitions.”
STORYTELLING
The collective gives residents the chance to share the impact of those evictions through its Human City Project, which is made up of a collection of art and media ventures owned and run by members of the Port Harcourt community.
On one of the city’s waterfronts, in a solar-powered building called The Media Shed, a team of volunteers run Chicoco Studios, producing and performing songs about the evictions and other issues that affect people living in slums.
Like the other parts of the project - which is mainly funded by grants from organizations and charities - the studio gets its name from the black mud that Port Harcourt residents pull from the swamps to reclaim the land on which they build their homes.
Dickson Abibo, a musician and producer, regularly tours the area with other musicians to put on shows for residents.
They also hold “Sessions in the Shed”, inviting young locals to the studio to collaborate on songs.
“We come together to build our own original, unique sounds that reflect the daily experiences of slum dwellers,” said Abibo.
Nearby, Chicoco Radio broadcasts the tracks that come out of the Shed sessions and produces a weekly drama series in which the characters face the same challenges Port Harcourt residents deal with every day - from poor infrastructure to crime.
“It shows how we live in waterfront communities, our problems, our good and bad sides,” explained Sotonye Sekibo, a local radio actor and reporter.
ARMED WITH INFORMATION
While the project gives residents a platform to tell their stories, it also helps them have a say in what happens to them next, said Uwemedimo, who is currently a visiting fellow at King’s College London.
The Chicoco Maps program collects geographic information about Port Harcourt that residents can use to take part in decision-making about the area.
Volunteers regularly go out into the communities to index every building and conduct household surveys, gathering details on factors such as population, topography, land use, employment, and health.
The results are fed into a database which residents can refer to when dealing with authorities, security forces and non-profits who want to bring new initiatives or development projects to their neighborhoods.
As an example, Uwemedimo pointed to a recent community survey in one neighborhood where responses from residents showed that together they were spending 18 million naira (about $59,000) on water annually.
So, they started pooling their money to buy a shared solar-powered borehole, which they hope will reduce their energy bills.
Community mapping has also been vital in the fight against the forced evictions that sparked the Human City Project in the first place, Uwemedimo said.
With every building cataloged, demolitions are easy to track and residents can use that information to support their demands for compensation, he noted.
“Now ordinary people are able to speak up and stand up to powerful forces like the government,” said Sekibo, the radio actor.
Sekibo and other Port Harcourt residents said the project has made it easier for them to protect their homes.
Since the project launched, they noted, forced evictions are not as common as they used to be.
“This project has changed our lives and shaped how we look at things and issues around us,” said Prince Nosa, a slum dweller who trained for four years under the project and is now a sound engineer.
“We now know and understand our rights and we are always ready to support any slum community if demolition is ever mentioned again.”
By Linus Unah
Reuters
The residents soon began directing him, he said, making sure he did not miss any of the destruction in August 2009.
“Film this, film that,” he recalled them saying.
And when the British-Nigerian documentary maker was arrested by security forces, the residents of the slum in the city of Port Harcourt hid his camera and kept it safe until he was released later that day.
“They recognized the camera as an instrument they could use to literally frame what is important to them, to tell their story, to give their perspective,” said Uwemedimo.
According to housing advocates, half of Port Harcourt’s more than 1 million residents live in slums.
Many of those residents live in waterfront areas, on land with prime real-estate value, and have no official housing documentation, noted Isa Sanusi, spokesman for Amnesty International Nigeria.
That makes them especially vulnerable to evictions, he said.
“Generally, Nigerian authorities use forced eviction in the course of urban renewal ... with the land they formerly occupied being developed into luxury real estate,” he explained - although the cleared area in Njemanze remains undeveloped.
Uwemedimo said his experience in Njemanze showed him how desperate the residents were to draw attention to what was happening to them, and he wanted to help.
In 2010, with former journalist Ana Bonaldo, he co-founded the Collaborative Media Advocacy Platform (CMAP), a collective of filmmakers, urban planners, researchers and Port Harcourt residents who use art, music and data collection to mobilize the people impacted by forced evictions.
The group has since grown to more than 40 volunteers.
One of the first things Uwemedimo did with it was take a giant, inflatable mobile cinema on a tour of low-income communities in the city to show them films about forced evictions around the world and in their own neighborhood.
“We found cinema was a good way of gathering people, of animating people, of creating debate,” he told the Thomson Reuters Foundation from his living room, with a computer blasting out songs about evictions.
A spokeswoman for the ministry of urban planning would not comment on specific eviction cases, but said the government had an obligation to take down unsafe or unauthorized buildings.
“The state carries out demolitions when buildings do not follow the approved building plan, or are built illegally or in unauthorized areas,” she said.
“For example where you have high tension cables, building on top of waterways or in unapproved areas - all that can lead to demolitions.”
STORYTELLING
The collective gives residents the chance to share the impact of those evictions through its Human City Project, which is made up of a collection of art and media ventures owned and run by members of the Port Harcourt community.
On one of the city’s waterfronts, in a solar-powered building called The Media Shed, a team of volunteers run Chicoco Studios, producing and performing songs about the evictions and other issues that affect people living in slums.
Like the other parts of the project - which is mainly funded by grants from organizations and charities - the studio gets its name from the black mud that Port Harcourt residents pull from the swamps to reclaim the land on which they build their homes.
Dickson Abibo, a musician and producer, regularly tours the area with other musicians to put on shows for residents.
They also hold “Sessions in the Shed”, inviting young locals to the studio to collaborate on songs.
“We come together to build our own original, unique sounds that reflect the daily experiences of slum dwellers,” said Abibo.
Nearby, Chicoco Radio broadcasts the tracks that come out of the Shed sessions and produces a weekly drama series in which the characters face the same challenges Port Harcourt residents deal with every day - from poor infrastructure to crime.
“It shows how we live in waterfront communities, our problems, our good and bad sides,” explained Sotonye Sekibo, a local radio actor and reporter.
ARMED WITH INFORMATION
While the project gives residents a platform to tell their stories, it also helps them have a say in what happens to them next, said Uwemedimo, who is currently a visiting fellow at King’s College London.
The Chicoco Maps program collects geographic information about Port Harcourt that residents can use to take part in decision-making about the area.
Volunteers regularly go out into the communities to index every building and conduct household surveys, gathering details on factors such as population, topography, land use, employment, and health.
The results are fed into a database which residents can refer to when dealing with authorities, security forces and non-profits who want to bring new initiatives or development projects to their neighborhoods.
As an example, Uwemedimo pointed to a recent community survey in one neighborhood where responses from residents showed that together they were spending 18 million naira (about $59,000) on water annually.
So, they started pooling their money to buy a shared solar-powered borehole, which they hope will reduce their energy bills.
Community mapping has also been vital in the fight against the forced evictions that sparked the Human City Project in the first place, Uwemedimo said.
With every building cataloged, demolitions are easy to track and residents can use that information to support their demands for compensation, he noted.
“Now ordinary people are able to speak up and stand up to powerful forces like the government,” said Sekibo, the radio actor.
Sekibo and other Port Harcourt residents said the project has made it easier for them to protect their homes.
Since the project launched, they noted, forced evictions are not as common as they used to be.
“This project has changed our lives and shaped how we look at things and issues around us,” said Prince Nosa, a slum dweller who trained for four years under the project and is now a sound engineer.
“We now know and understand our rights and we are always ready to support any slum community if demolition is ever mentioned again.”
By Linus Unah
Reuters
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