Determined to create job opportunities and industrialize Nigeria, the Dangote Group yesterday announced that it was scaling up its investment in agricultural sector.
Fielding questions from newsmen on the sideline of the ongoing 2nd edition of the Agribusiness Summit in Abuja Group Executive Director, Strategy, capital Project and Portfolio Development Mr. Devakumar VG Edwin said the new investments are significant and timely given the current rate of unemployment in the country.
According to him, agriculture employs 37 % of the population, adding that this is against the backdrop of 23 % unemployment rate in the country.
He said going forward; his company is upping its investment in rice, tomato paste, sugar and dairy products. He said presently the Dangote group is constructing state of the art storage silos, and as well carrying out parboiling, rice milling, polishing, sorting and parking units for a total capacity of one million tons of paddy.
Mr. Edwin said there is an ongoing “investment in 15,000 hectares to produce and process tomato paste of 150,000 tons per year. The current import is 0.5million tons per year.” He said his conglomerate was equally investing in 40,000 hectares to produce sugar, just as he hinted about the ongoing construction of a 3million tons fertilizer plant.