The Nigerian government is exploring collaborative arrangements with the World Bank to increase financing and technical support for the development of the nation’s mining sector.
Speaking during a courtesy visit to the minister, Dele Alake, on Monday, World Bank Country Director for Nigeria, Shubham Chaudhuri, expressed satisfaction with the renewed focus on development of the nation’s mineral resources by the Tinubu administration.
The development finance banker pointed out that with the magnitude of economically viable minerals in Nigeria, the country had the potential to make the sector a major contributor to its Gross Domestic Product (GDP).
Chaudhuri reiterated the readiness of the Bank to partner with the Ministry of Solid Minerals Development, to unlock financing for specific intervention areas requiring funding, emphasising, however, that the terms and conditions of the bank to ensure effective implementation of projects and transparency in utilising funds was mandatory.
He also added that the bank was not restricted to providing financing alone, asserting it had the capacity to offer technical assistance to improve mining operations in the country.
In his remarks, the minister commended the World Bank team for the visit, especially based on the development finance institution’s continued support in diverse sectors of the economy over the years.
The minister said: “The World Bank has been able to redirect focus on developmental issues and projects in countries, especially Nigeria. Just recently, we had the support of the World Bank on palliatives being rolled out after fuel subsidy removal. We had appreciable support from the World Bank.
“I thank you for your involvement in the min diver project, which, unfortunately, is coming to a close. We look forward to strengthening collaboration, which will culminate in the needed funding for critical areas in the mining sector, alongside the requisite technical support, as earlier hinted”, Alake added.
Speaking about his vision for the mining sector, the minister revealed that the first major priority was investment in exploration to generate the requisite geo-data that would guide investors in making informed decisions about investing in the sector.
He hinted that efforts were ongoing to establish efficient governance structures and secure the mining environment.
Alake assured the World Bank team that the Federal Government was committed to providing an enabling environment to safeguard mining operations whilst ensuring maximum beneficiation to host communities and accruable revenue to government through royalties and taxes.
