The Federal Government has secured investment commitments of more than 30 billion dollars across different sectors of the economy.
Dr Doris Anite, the Minister, Industry, Trade, and Investment (FMITI), said this during her presentation at the Ministerial Sectoral News Conference to mark President Bola Tinubu’s first year in office on Tuesday in Abuja.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that her presentation was titled “Unlocking Trade and Investment to Achieve Renewed Hope Agenda “- Key Achievements and Contributions of the ministry.
Anite said Nigeria’s investment landscape was now witnessing a significant influx of foreign capital, aligning with the Renewed Hope agenda Tinubu.
She said in addition, the ministry was taking decisive and structured steps to attract capital investments, which would transform the nation’s homegrown enterprises and industries into global players.
“We have concluded stakeholders’ engagements with our domestic private equity and asset management firms towards the inauguration of an Investment Mobilisation Initiative aimed at increasing local and foreign investment as a catalyst for economic growth.”
The minister said in a bid to boost private equity capital formation, the Nigeria diaspora fund was initiated.
“The Nigeria diaspora remit between 20 to 25 billion dollars annually according to the World Bank, but these remittances have not been channeled intentionally to private equity.
“ Therefore, the investment initiative by my ministry is creating the platform to target, mobilise and utilise some of these funds into the productive economy.
“Our Private Equity and Asset Management firms are adept at attracting investments and the support from the Ministry is an assurance that the government is backing this investment drive.
“Government will provide the enabling environment, remove the roadblocks and red tapes to ensure that these investments thrive.”
Anite said the investment drive was not limited to only Nigerian Diasporans, but the ministry was also reaching out to all fund providers.
She said the ministry had also received support from development finance partners.
“I have no doubt that with the success of this initiative, Nigeria will witness a boom in the formation of businesses, and a strong financial and capital market.
“Nigeria will also witness the creation of a strong economic and industrial base to catalyse a one trillion dollar Gross Domestic Product (GDP) economy.”
Anite said the ministry was set to host the Nigeria Investment Summit, a platform to connect domestic and global investors to Nigeria.
“We are creating and de-risking the investment opportunities in Nigeria, and will showcase these as we inaugurate our digital dealroom which will present the investment opportunities and help facilitate the investments to happen.”
She said this had become necessary because most contracts issued in Nigeria had other jurisdictions as places for arbitration, mostly England.
“We have observed that this is so because most businesses experience delays in the arbitration and legal process for enforcing contracts.
“This red tape will be removed with the automated commercial courts, and this will boost investor confidence and increase investment flows.