The African Development Bank has said that phase two of the Special Agro-Industrial Processing Zones will revolutionise agricultural practices and shift Nigeria from an agrarian economy to an industrial society that is based on agribusiness.
A statement made available to newsmen on Tuesday, and signed by AfDB said it will begin with a workshop from the 6th – 7th of September, 2023.
It noted that the inception workshop was the first in the series of the bank’s ongoing stakeholders’ engagements aimed at harvesting input and harmonising various interests in preparation for the commencement of the second phase of the SAPZ Program in Nigeria.
According to the statement, 20 states had sent an Expression of Interest and would be hosted, assessed and hopefully onboarded.
The Senior Special Advisor on Industrialisation to the President of the AfDB, Professor Oyelaran-Oyeyinka Oyebanji, said the establishment of the SAPZ in Nigeria was an industrial strategy approach that was government-enabled and private sector-driven.
He explained that it was designed to stimulate private sector interest, drive a market-oriented agricultural transformation and to help develop modern agro-processing capacity across the continent.
