Chinese firm to set up N800bn steel plant

The Federal Government’s bid to magnetize more Foreign Direct Investment into the economy has received a boost from a Chinese steel company, Pangang Group Limited, which has expressed an interest to establish a $5bn (N800bn) steel manufacturing factory in the country.

The $5bn steel plant will enable the company to engender between four to five million metric tonnes of steel annually.

The development was attested by the Permanent Secretary, Federal Ministry of Industry, Trade and Investment, Ambassador Abdulkadir Musa, during a meeting with a delegation of the company led by the President, Pangang Group, Mr. Zhang Dade, at the ministry’s headquarters in Abuja.

He commended the company for capitalizing on the Nigeria Industrial Revolution Plan to invest the amount in an incipient steel plant, noting that Nigeria was one of the few countries with the friendliest policies for investors.

Musa, who represented the Minister of Industry, Trade and Investment, Mr. Olusegun Aganga, at the meeting, verbalized the NIRP had made the steel sector central in the industrialisation process of the country.

He verbally expressed, “The intention is to give boost to industrialisation in Nigeria, especially in the manufacturing sector; engender employment among Nigerians and reduce our import bills predicated on the products we could have engendered in the country.

“The steel industry in Nigeria is quite open and transparent, and we welcome people who want to participate in the development of steel in Nigeria.”

Musa verbally expressed that the regime had proposed legislation in the National Assembly to empower entrepreneurs and forfend their investments in the country.