The Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, Dr Zainab Ahmed, has stated the Federal Government’s commitment to put in place enabling policies and incentives to attract private sector investments in the Special Agro-industrial Processing Zones to ensure successful implementation.

According to a statement by the African Development Bank Group, the minister stated the government support of the public-private partnerships aimed at developing priority value chains through developing infrastructure in rural areas at a high-level briefing session held on Monday.

Ahmed said, “The Federal Government is committed to successfully implementing the programme to increase agricultural production, reduce poverty, and scale up job creation across the country.”

Ahmed said all 36 states in Nigeria and the Federal Capital Territory would be eligible to participate in the SAPZ programme.

On his part, the Director-General, AfDB’s Nigeria Department, Lamin Barrow, said the zones would be rolled out in 18 African countries, including Nigeria.

Barrow said, “The bank and its development partners are mobilizing $520 million to co-finance the first phase of the program in Nigeria, to be implemented in phases across six geo-political zones.”

Minister of Industry, Trade and Investment, Otunba Richard Adebayo, said, “strong private sector participation will ensure that the project aligns with the Federal Government’s industrialization agenda.”

The Senior Adviser on Industrialisation to the President of the African Development Bank, Prof Oyebanji Oyeleran-Oyeyinka, said, “The zone model is an explicit industrialisation strategy to transform poor rural spaces into zones of prosperity, stem rural-urban migration, end human insecurity induced by herder-farmers clashes, and provide employment to Nigerian youth.”

The statement added that IFAD’s Associate Vice President for Programme Management, Donald Brown, stated that the flagship project would enable IFAD to take its relationship with the AfDB to another level.