| Pelosi, Calif. Gov to receive Speaker Bankole as World Agric Expo highlights Nigeria |
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| Written by Laolu Akande | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| Wednesday, 30 January 2008 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Nigeria's effort to reachout and draw foreign investment for agriculture may be paying off as the country has been picked as the focus of this year's annual World Agric Expo in California, USA, Empowered Newswire reports. The largest Agric trade event in the world will be coming up next month and more than 1600 agric-based companies from over 67 countries are expected where Nigeria would be the main piece of exhibition. Leading the Nigerian team to the the yearly Agric Expo coming up between February 12 and 14 is the Speaker of Nigeria's House of Representatives Dimeji Bankole who has also been named the Guest of Honor. He will be leading a Nigerian government delegation including several federal legislators and ministers, and representatives of 8 state governments including at least 6 state governors. States to be represented are Benue, Gombe, Rivers, Plateau, Yobe, Borno, Kano and Niger. House of Representatives members confirmed to participate include the Chairman of the House Committee on Agriculture Hon. Gbenga Makanjuola, and others like Honorables Andrew Uchendu, John Agoda, Solomon Agidani, Abasi Braimah and Olumiyiwa Obadina. Expected to welcome Bankole and the Nigerian delegation are his counterpart in the US, Mrs. Nancy Pelosi, the US Speaker and number 3 American govt. official, who represents the state of California and the California State Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, whose state annually hosts the expo. Bankole will also be delivering a keynote speech at the Opening event of the 2008 World Agric Expo on the 12th of February. According to a statement by one of the planners of the World Agric Expo, Muyiwa Omololu of the Alliance for Agriculture Corporation, a US-based company the International Agric-Center Inc. which runs the largest agric trade event in the world has consented to focussing on Nigeria this year. In his letter of acceptance to be the event's Guest of Honor, Bankole said he is looking forward to the event to have "fruitful interactions that will achieve the objective of attracting foreign investors to take advantage of Nigeria's abundant agricultural potentials." Omololu, a former US based investment banker who has since become one of the leading and active planners of the World Agric Expo in Tulare, California said one of the core objective of this year's focus on Nigeria "is to stimulate foreign investments in Nigeria's agricultural and biofuel sector." The expo's slogan for the Nigerian focus "Nigeria Opens Up"and the first leg of the Programme will be Nigerian entities exhibiting at the largest agric trade event in the world for the first time in the expo's 40-year history. Omololu said "this initiative aims at attracting foreign investors to Nigeria's unique agricultural resources from over 1,600 agriculture-related companies exhibiting and over 100,000 local, national and international attendees from 67 countries at the 2008 World Agric Expo, the world's largest gathering of the agriculture industry. This also plays into this administration's seven point agenda of which agriculture and food security is an integral part. " Apart from the exhibition, another leg of the focus on Nigeria a "Nigerian VIP Biofuel Summit" at the Wynn Resort in Las Vegas, Nevada on February, two days after the exhibition. The summit will bring together members of the financial community in and out of Nigeria, the NNPC Renewable Energy Division, the government agency charged with Biofuel development in Nigeria and Parliamentarians from the House of Representatives to exchange ideas about the financial, legal and technical aspects of Nigeria's Biofuel Programme. Technical discussions will be handled by the representatives of NNPC & Accenture Consulting & Agland Investments Inc. of California –a US company that has already conducted Biofuels economic feasibility studies on two sugarcane sites in Benue State and a third site in Gombe State. Another key participant is a renowned food scientist, Mr. Tony Bello of Kellogg Corporation USA. He will lead the breakout session on food processing possibilities in Nigeria. There will also be legal and legislative breakout sessions to be addressed by members of the Nigerian House of Representatives led by Speaker Dimeji Bankole. That session will examine "The Nigerian Biofuel Policy and Incentives Official Gazette" that will give legal life to Nigeria's Biofuel Industry. Already that Official Gazette was approved by the Obasanjo administration, but still awaiting enactment into law in the House of Representatives. To capture the financial aspects of Biofuels there will also be a finance session to be moderated by a representative of a US investment firm, Morgan Stanley and members of the banking sector in Nigeria. This discussion will center on NNPC's Biofuel Joint Venture with investors on the development of a 20,000 hectare sugarcane plantation with an integrated ethanol plant with an investment cost of $300 million that will also have the capacity to generate 60 MW of electricity that could be sold to the national grid. Omololu's outfit, the Alliance for Agriculture Corporation is a California based non profit organization affiliated with the International Agri-Center, Inc. organisers of the world's largest agricultural trade event. Alliance for Agriculture has an international mission "to change the agricultural paradigms" in Nigeria and Africa by leveraging the academic, economic, political and technical resources of the United States of America, particularly the State of California being the 10th largest economy in the world where the agriculture industry is an annual enterprise of $27 Billion.
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Posted by Robot| 30.01.2008 09:52