The Africa Investment Forum (AIF) has secured a fresh $34.8 billion in investment interest for the continent.

The amount which is an outcome of a three-day AIF Market Days held in Marrakesh, Morocco, brings the total value of investment commitment secured by the forum since 2018 when it started to close to $178 billion. At the close of last year’s edition held in Côte d’Ivoire, about $143 billion was mobilised.

Speaking at the closing ceremony yesterday, the President of African Development Bank Group, Dr Akinwumi Adesina, said the interests cut across health, creative industry, renewable energy, agriculture, infrastructure and other critical sectors of the economy.

Adesina said the meeting demonstrated that Africa has emerged as a destination for global investment. He described Africa as the frontier of the global economy, noting that it is bankable.

Earlier in his remarks, the Managing Director and Chief Executive of Nigeria Liquified Natural Gas, (NLNG) Limited, Dr. Philip Mshelbila, has listed federal government’s import tax, Value Added Tax (VAT) and the chronic shortage of foreign exchange facing importers as key variables behind rising cost of cooking gas in Nigeria.

He has therefore urged the federal government to take a second look at those factors which he said impact about 60 percent of the product component if it wants Nigerians to enjoy lower prices of cooking gas.

The NLNG boss said in terms of pricing, he could not speak about the backend of the market, noted that it is obvious that “our supply makes only 40 percent of supply for the local market, the remaining 60 percent has to be imported and many of the marketers are struggling to source forex.”

He also noted that LPG is also subject to import duty and VAT and that is one of areas that the federal government has to into look at if the country wants to lower the price of the product.

NLNG CEO averred that two years ago, they took a decision that NLNG’s butane and propane would be sold to the local market as cooking gas, and they have kept to that decision.

“We have struggled with propane because our local market cannot take all our production. We have just a few customers that can take our propane which includes Indorama a private company. But they could not take all our propane and so from time to time, we export some of the products, not because we want to export, but because our local market cannot take all of our production,” he said.

Mshelbila further explained that Nigeria needs more investments in that area so that more development and investments need to take place, adding that Propane can be used for transportation, power generation, and cell phone tower.

He remarked that there is a huge investment opportunity in propane, noting that the product is available, but it is a issue of balancing supply and demand to create opportunity for more investment inflows to come into the country.

According to him, “I can’t speak much about German discussion with the federal government of Nigeria because that is between them. But I can tell you that the decade of gas aspiration we are talking about is one that focuses on both domestic and export market. It is focused on allowing Nigeria to develop all its gas resources, some can go into export market, but the domestic market to ensure we have a enough gas to power industry, transportation, petrochemical and others. It is basically about unlocking our gas resources. NLNG today as earlier stated exports its Liquified natural gas.

“I believe Nigeria can benefit from investments, not only from the natural gas industry, but also in the renewable energy and across the energy value chain. But we cannot get other benefits, if people don’t hear our story, we need people to hear our story. There are opportunities for investors as have been said by different speakers and African Development Bank Group (AFDB). Investors need to make returns and that return needs to be sustainable overtime, which include having things such as corporate governance. NLNG is a good demonstration of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in Nigeria where billions of US have been invested. But there are still opportunities for small investments across the oil and gas value chain that need to embraced. There should be a systematic approach can be used. In the North, sun is available in the body of the Sahara. There are some areas in Nigeria where wind is strong and it requires looking at the whole system to make policies that drive investments.”