How FG Is Boosting The Campaign Made-In-Nigeria Products


The
Federal Government has said it is more committed to boosting the
patronage of made-in-Nigeria products among its Ministries, Departments
and Agencies.
Speaking in Abuja
on Thursday, at the National Media Launch of the “Buy Made-in-Nigeria”
Campaign, the Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed
reiterated that the Federal Government is not just paying lip service to
the Made-in-Nigeria campaign.

“We have taken concrete steps
to actualize it. It is true that the Federal Executive Council at one of
its meetings resolved that the Bureau of Public Procurement Act must be
amended in a manner that will give more emphasis and advantage to made
in Nigeria products.

”However, we have also realized that
less than 30% of government spending ever gets to the level of Bureau
for Public Procurement, which means that we must start a ‘root and
branch’ reform. This campaign must go down to the level of Permanent
Secretaries and Ministerial approvals so that we can actually be able to
encourage Nigerians, because as long as we do not encourage the buying
of Made-in-Nigeria products, what we are going to do is that we are
going to continue exporting jobs to other countries and importing unemployment,” the Minister said.

President Buhari Is Neither Ill Nor Taking Treatment - Lai Mohammed Insists
Lai
Mohammed stressed that Nigerian youths cannot be gainfully employed
across the country unless Nigerians in general, change their consumption
pattern by patronizing Made-in-Nigeria products in order to give a
boost to the local economy.
He said the government is taking
advantage of all the digital platforms on the Internet to connect with
the youths and convince them to take ownership of the buy
Made-in-Nigeria Campaign, in order to secure their future.

While
reiterating the Federal Government’s commitment to encouraging local
manufacturers by enhancing the ease of doing business in Nigeria, the
Minister said:
“The Federal Government is determined to ensure
that we move at least 20 steps up the rank of world global standard of
doing business and in the last couple of months, we have achieved some
milestone. We have, for instance, been able to achieve 31 major reforms
across 8 major indicators in the area of Ease of Doing Business,
starting from movement of passengers and goods to the time it takes you
to register a company.”

He also said the Micro, Small and
Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) clinic taking place across the country is a
deliberate strategy to make available all the stakeholders involved in
MSMEs operations, with a view to easing all the bureaucratic bottlenecks
to improve the performance of MSMEs.


In
the same vein, the Minister of Industry, Trade and Investment, Dr.
Okechukwu Enelamah, harped on the need to create a conducive environment
for local manufacturers to thrive. He said:
“It’s one thing
to say buy Made-in-Nigeria, it’s another thing to make it easy for them
to make things in Nigeria and to reduce the cost of making things in
Nigeria. Consumers are rational and we are not necessarily forcing them.
It’s a campaign so it means that one of the most important
responsibilities we have as a people and as a government is to reduce
the cost of doing business; to make the cost of producing things here
cheaper and more affordable.”

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