Nigeria Can Earn More Foreign Exchange From Agric Than Crude Oil- Chapel Hill

Nigeria’s independent investment banking firm, Chapel Hill Denham, has said Nigeria’s agricultural sector has the potential to generate more foreign exchange for Nigeria than the sale of crude oil.

The Chapel Hill Chief Executive Officer, Bolaji Balogun, said this when he appeared on Arise TV programme monitored by THE WHISTLER.

The agriculture sector contributes only 24.65 per cent of the Gross Domestic Product in the second quarter of 2020 and 28.41 per cent in the third quarter, according to official data from the National Bureau of Statistics.

In the same period, the sector only grew by 19.9 per cent in the second quarter of 2020 and 13.52 per cent in the third quarter.

Balogun said the Federal Government must embark on a massive, rapid and sustained investment in Nigeria’s infrastructure.

He said, “If you bring power, you will be amazed by the manufacturing investments that you are going to attract. You will be amazed how power changes your agriculture from low value agriculture which is what we have today to high value.”

He said with investment in infrastructure, farmers would have the capacity to process and preserve all of their agricultural produce.

Balogun was also optimistic that the farm produce could be exported to get the needed dollars to save the naira from devaluation.