Posted by The federal and state governments have been urged by the Manufacturers Association of Nigeria, or MAN, to allocate the savings from the elimination of gasoline subsidies to the economy’s more productive sectors.
The association also pushed the Central Bank of Nigeria, or CBN, to create a long-term framework that would direct credit intervention to the manufacturing sector, and charged sub-national governments to use the Electricity Act to boost the power sector and support made-in-Nigeria goods on all its purchases and contracts.
In addition to making these requests, MAN President Otunba Francis Meshioye urged the CBN to give the real sector priority when allocating foreign exchange and to strategically direct remittances toward non-oil industries like the manufacturing sector.
Meshioye advised giving priority to the manufacturers when allocating forex and credit, and concentrating BDCs into a small number of well-known, sizable operators to control their excesses and undesirable activities through efficient administration and oversight.
In addition, the head of MAN stated that, in addition to direct interventions, the CBN ought to create a long-term structure for directing credit interventions into the manufacturing sector.
To expedite the realization of a $1 trillion economy, he continued, commercial banks should be encouraged to consciously lend long-term, single-digit interest rates to the industrial sector.
In order to maintain the correct structure of their operations, he underlined that the apex bank must decrease the number of Bureau de Change operators.