The National Centre for Technology Management (NACETEM) says that large-scale agricultural production with innovative technologies can put an end to the $600 million sugar imports into the country.
NACETEM’s Director-General, Dr Olusola Odusanya, disclosed this yesterday, during Nigeria-EU Innovation Days, in Lagos.
He said that Nigeria has the capacity to produce more than five times of sugar it consumes every year.
” It is sad that Nigeria imports 98 percent of the sugar it consumes, spending $ 600 million to do this every year.
But this will be stopped if we adopt large-scale agricultural production with innovative technologies,” Odusanya said.
The NACETEM DG said almost all Nigerians consume sugar daily and Nigeria could make enough foreign exchange if it focuses on large-scale sugarcane production.
He said: “Everyone of us might have consumed sugar this morning. But we import it instead of producing it on a large- scale and export it. This will fetch us enough foreign exchange and create jobs in the country.”
He said technology innovation in agricultural production and other sectors will make large scale production easy and reduce Nigeria’s dependence on foreign goods.
Odusanya said NACETEM is currently awaiting the Federal Executive Council approval on some of its innovative policies including commercialisation of some research outputs.