Stakeholders have advocated for a transition to a more production-based economy for Nigeria to achieve its $1 trillion economy target by 2030.
They made this known at the Nigerian Society of Chemical Engineers (NSChE) 33th Fellows Conference in Abuja on Friday with the theme: “From Consumption to Production Economy in Nigeria — The Pathways.”
The Guest Speaker, Prof. Banji Oyelaran-Oyeyinka, noted that achieving a one trillion dollar GDP requires sustained annual growth through productive industrialisation and innovation.
Oyelaran-Oyeyinka, who is also the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Industrialisation at the African Development Bank Group, said Nigeria aspired to attain a one trillion dollar economy by 2030.
He, however, said the President of Nigeria recently expressed only the desire to achieve seven per cent annual growth.
“To determine Nigeria’s right GDP per capita-growth as it moves from a GDP of 243 billion dollars to one trillion dollars, we need to accumulate additional 757 billion dollars.
“Let us assume a steady annual growth rate for three scenarios: 10, 15 or 20 years.
“Results show the following; If we are to attain one trillion dollars in 10 years, growth rate will be: 14.7 per cent , in 15 years, 9.6 per cent and in 20 years, 7.3 per cent.”
Oyelaran-Oyeyinka said that if Nigeria could arrive at the President’s aspirational seven per cent, the nation would achieve a 51 trillion dollars economy in about 23 years.
He explained that growth was synonymous with industrialisation, adding that since the mid-1980s Nigeria has however been deindustrialising.
“It has become our lot to see ‘Made in Nigeria’ as inferior. This habit has foisted on the nation a ruinous pathological dependency,” he stated.
According to him, Nigeria’s overdependence on oil has transformed it into a “Consumption Economy” that rewards imports, neglects domestic manufacturing, and exposes the country to global market shocks.
Oyelaran-Oyeyinka, therefore, urged the government to prioritise sectors with strong growth potential such as agriculture, light manufacturing, leather, textiles, and petrochemicals.
These sectors, he said, have natural and human resource advantages and can generate strong backward and forward linkages.
He criticised the chronic neglect of strategic industries like steel, citing the failure to operationalise the Ajaokuta and Delta Steel complexes after decades of promises.
Oyelaran-Oyeyinka identified lithium mining and processing as a key opportunity for Nigeria’s industrial diversification, adding that Nigeria has high-grade lithium deposits in Kaduna, Nasarawa, Kogi, Kwara, Ekiti, and Cross River states.
He urged the government to develop a strategic framework for local lithium processing, rather than exporting raw minerals.
The President, Nigerian Society of Chemical Engineers, Bayo Olarewaju, expressed worry over Nigeria’s dependence on consumption economy and called for the establishment of a unified engineering research council to synergise experts from various engineering disciplines.
This, he said, was to drive indigenous innovation and industrialisation.
He said that sustainable development should begin with self-reliance and local production, noting that dependence on foreign products had kept the country economically vulnerable and technologically backward.
“We, as engineers, must think deeply about what is going on. We may go abroad, but in our minds, Nigeria is home.
“We must build and develop Nigeria for our children and grandchildren,” he said.
Olarewaju therefore, called on young engineers to take up the challenge of rebuilding Nigeria through innovation, research, and collaboration.
“It is not enough to complain. We must put our heads together and act.
“Japan and China did it; we can too. Nigeria must rise again through the work of its engineers,” he said.
