Ministry urges FG to focus on mines, Steel development

The Ministry of Mines and Steel Development has urged the Federal Government to give special attention to the development of eight critical areas to improve the mineral and mining sector.

This is contained in the Ministry Roadmap made available to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) on Tuesday in Abuja.

It said that government should focus on Investor Friendly Regulatory Environment by conducting reviews of existing tax system, licensing fees and other various fees.

According the document, historically, Nigeria neglects the investor friendliness of its mining sector, after the shift to a state-led mining development model.

It said that significant infrastructure investments would be necessary to unlock mining full value chain potential in Nigeria.

“This will include the development of power plant, rail, roads, water processing plants among others in the country,’’ it said.

The report said that failure to take proper action and structure to protect and promote these capital investments appropriately, the growth rate of the mining sector would be constrained.

According to the report, the success in Nigerian mining sector requires partnership across multiple communities, stakeholders and institutions; the role of state governments as both co- investors and sector champions are critical.

The report said that success in mining would require that Nigeria as a society should interface with other branches of government, community activists, professional, societies, and investors.

“The high risk allocation in the early phase of mining projects means that activities such as exploration and ore reserve estimation have difficulty in obtaining funding from standard project finance sources.

“The Solid Minerals Development Fund (SMDF) envisioned in the mining act would be operationalised and made available under well defined terms to help de-risk activities in the sector.

“The ministry anticipates that the various initiatives that will emerge from financial sponsors and other market actors will receive support from the SMDF to broaden its capacity to support both exploration and development activities.’’

The roadmap said that Institutional Reform, Geoscientific Value Add and Mining as Development Catalyst, were among the critical factors needed to move the sector forward.