The Bank of Industry (BoI) has secured a €60 million credit facility from the European Investment Bank (EIB) to support Nigeria's cocoa processing and dairy industries, as the country intensifies efforts to move beyond exporting raw agricultural commodities.
Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer of BoI, Dr. Olasupo Olusi, announced the funding at the Africa Cocoa Summit held in Abuja on Tuesday.
The summit, convened by the Federal Ministry of Industry, Trade and Investment, brought together government officials and industry stakeholders from Nigeria, Ghana, Côte d’Ivoire and Cameroon to promote local cocoa processing and value addition.
Olusi said the €60 million forms part of a broader €85 million EIB-BoI financing package backed by the European Union under its Global Gateway initiative.
According to him, the facility will finance investments across Nigeria's cocoa and dairy value chains, with a focus on local processing, ingredient production and chocolate manufacturing.
He said the funding aligns with BoI’s commitment to supporting industrialisation, expanding local manufacturing capacity and creating jobs by increasing value addition within the agricultural sector.
The summit ended with participating countries signing the Abuja Declaration, establishing the Cocoa Value Addition Alliance (CVAA), a regional platform aimed at reducing Africa's dependence on raw cocoa exports and strengthening domestic processing and branding.
President Bola Tinubu, represented by the Minister of Agriculture and Food Security, Senator Abubakar Kyari, urged African cocoa-producing countries to prioritise value addition and capture a greater share of the global chocolate market, saying the continent must move from exporting raw beans to producing finished products.
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