Dysfunctional steel industry bane of Nigeria’s industrial growth, says NSE president

President of Nigeria Society of Engineers (NSE), Mr Ademola Olorunfemi, has blamed the limited growth of the manufacturing sector in Nigeria to absence of functional steel industry in the country. He also said that the problem had continued to stall rapid development of skill and technology required to drive industrial growth.

Olorunfemi, fielding questions from newsmen in Abuja on Friday, said that the development of iron and steel was a key ingredient in the industrialisation and development of infrastructure. He said that the steel sector in developed economies was the highest employer of labour and treated as a strategic sector because of the positive multiplier effect of its employment.

“Despite the abundance of natural raw materials such as limestone, ore and coal required for the production of primary steel, Nigeria’s iron and steel sector remains comatose, having only a negligible local production. It experiences low return on investment and is heavily dependent on importation of steel. It is troubling that the nation continues to moan under the enormous burden of employment but spends N500 billion annually on steel importations”, he said. He, therefore, called of the Federal Government to urgently formulate an iron and steel development agenda.

The president said there was an urgent need to revamp the moribund inland rolling mills in Jos and Katsina as well as the Delta Steel Company, Aladja. He said it was also imperative for the government to resolve the problems with the concession issues of Ajaokuta Steel Company and the National Iron Ore Mining Company at Itakpe.

He commended President Goodluck Jonathan’s desire for rapid economic development.

This is as expressed through the launching of Nigeria Industrial Revolution Plan (NIRP) and Nation Enterprises Development Programme (NEDEP).

The held that appropriate synergy was required in the process. He said that the nation lacked “coherent and articulated metals policy and plans that strategically interface with national development goals in the transportation, power, oil and gas ans agriculture sectors.”

Olorunfemi said unbundling and diversifications of NITEL, NNPC, NIGERDOCK and PHCN should be done in the steel sector. “Having presented the prevalent perspective in our march for steel development, we are now in a most critical period and further delay would, without doubt, benefit only fraudulent few’’, he said. He said that no country had industrialised through buying and selling of goods produced in other countries.