The African Development Bank (AfDB) has expressed dismay over the slow progress of the first phase of Nigeria’s Special Agro-Industrial Processing Zones (SAPZs-1) project, especially with $210 million ready for the implementation of the project in some select states in the country.
The development finance institution, in its latest ‘Implementation Progress and Results Report’ dated January 30, 2025, published on its website, lamented that 98.39% of the total funds approved for the project remained undisbursed more than two years after the approval of the kick-off of the project was approved.
The SAPZS-I project was approved in December 2021 as part of the bank’s and development partners to support Nigeria’s agro-industrial growth by establishing processing hubs with supporting infrastructure, and improving agricultural productivity.
The report partly reads: “Procurement of supervision consultants for the DBO contractors is at RFP stage in the case of Kaduna State and REOI stage for Oyo, Imo and Cross River State Design, Build and Operate bidding documents have been cleared for four states of Kaduna, Cross River, Oyo and Ogun states and Kaduna has already advertised its DBO.
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“All these will result in improved implementation, disbursement, and rating in the year 2025. However overall performance status from the time of project approval to date is relatively slow, especially with respect to project disbursement”, the AfDB added.
Under the terms of the facility, the AfDB is to provide $160 million of the total loan, while the Africa Growing Together Fund (AGTF), which a $2 billion facility of the People’s Bank of China being administered by the AfDB, will provide the balance of $50 million.
The development finance institution lamented that despite the availability of the fund, the disbursement had been rather sluggish with the attendant negative implications for timely completion of the first phase of the SAPZs project.
Specifically, the bank listed administrative inefficiencies, weak capacity among project staff, and delays in procurement processes as among the key factors militating against timely disbursement of funds for the implementation of the project.
In addition, it also expressed concerns about the slow progress in Imo State, where no serious activity has commenced under the project unlike Cross River, Kaduna, Ogun and Oyo states where some progress had been made, and adviseed the Imo State Government to start the project’s implementation or risk losing its share of the loan.
Similarly, the bank also directed Ogun State Government to provide an acceptable Service Level Agreement (SLA), which defines the level of service expected from a vendor, to ensure continued funding of the project in the state
