The Federal Government has assured Nigerians that the price of cement will soon
reduce as the second phase of cement policy which it is currently pursuing will
address the issue of pricing.
Minister of Industry, Trade and
Investment, Mr Olusegun Aganga, gave this indication while explaining why the
price of cement still remained high in spite of the increase in production and
availability.
Speaking Tuesday, in Abuja,
during the 2013 Ministerial platform by the ministry, Aganga said what
government was targeting in the first phase of the backward integration policy
of cement was production and availability and that had been achieved.
“The first strategy on backward
integration on cement was about availability and production of cement that has
been achieved, we were spending more than N250 billion on cement importation
before now.
“That number should have gone
up by now and yet we have the raw materials and we were not producing, we were
only producing two million metric tonnes.
“We now produce 28 million
metric tonnes of cement, we now export, we have achieved availability and
production.”
The Minister said the second
phase of the integrated policy, which would address the issue of pricing, had
just started and a committee had already been set up to work on it.
“The committee is working on it
now it is about pricing, control, quality, use of cement and export.
“I can assure you that we are
working on that already and we will do everything to ensure that the consumers
are protected.”
It will be recalled that
Nigerians have continued to buy cement at prices which observers consider
exorbitant, currently, a bag of 50kg of cement costs between N1,650 and N1,800.
Tribune
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