Nigeria Losing Billions To Low Investments In Creative Industry—Obi Asika

The Convener of Omniverse and founder of Storm 360, Obi Asika, has said that Nigeria is missing out on the multi-billion revenue from the creative industry because of the lack of infrastructure like Netflix and Amazon as well as world class venues.

Asika also believes that the creative economy could deliver 10 million jobs if the government concessions the ‘dead’ stadium and other moribund entertainment infrastructure.

He said this during an interview on Arise TV on the creation of the new Ministry of Art, Culture and Creative Economy.

The decline in revenue made the government to create new ministries that would help the government generate more funds to meet its financial obligations.

Asika said, “The creative economy has about 24 sectors- fashion and music, arts and culture, performing arts, theatre dance, software technology, advertising and broadcast. So, the creative economy is enormous. In terms of infrastructure, we have 400 universities, and we have 40 stadiums in major cities but what needs to happen is these stadiums are old stadiums and the government has lots of dead assets that it can concession.

“In terms of touring, one thing I just want to correct is that we are not exporting all the money. When you are touring internationally, you are generating money internationally. The money that is being exported from Nigeria is because we haven’t built enough domestic platforms.”

The Storm 360 boss said industry players and the government need to stimulate investment in streaming platforms, and building of venues and theatres among others in other to avoid capital flights.

He said the lack of infrastructure has given the likes of Netflix, Amazon and Spotify an undue advantage over the domestic market.

Asika said, “So, if you want to stream, you have Spotify, Apple Music, Netflix, and Amazon, yes some of the money is going out but of course, some of the money is coming into the economy because without that investment, we can’t create the product.

“But we need to stimulate the best domestic investment, domestic capital, the banks and capital investment and equity banks to build venues, build more production lots, build more opportunities, and more facilities that enable the industry.

“It is endless. from art galleries, to light venues, to stadiums, to performance spaces, to production lots. At the end of the day, this creative economy has the opportunity by 2030 to deliver something like 10 million jobs into this economy. I’m sure the new minister will be collaborating with leaders in the sector. Collaborating with other ministers, specifically the minister of finance, communication, and digital economy.”