The perennial shortage of foreign exchange affecting Nigeria is expected to continue until 2019, according to the junior minister for Petroleum Resources, Dr. Ibe Kachikwu.
Kachikwu made this known whilst speaking at an event in Lagos yesterday.
He said the demand for refined products was placing immense pressure on the greenback, and that only working and efficient refineries could alleviate the shortages.
Kachikwu stated, “We need to get our refineries to work optimally, in order to inject funds back to the economy. It is taking us four to six months to go through processes and bureaucracy even to get investors coming into the country and inject money to take the refinery to the point where it is needed.
“And the reality is that unless we do that, the dream and hope I had was that in 2018 we should begin to reduce drastically petroleum product import into the country and in 2019, we should be able to exceed total local demand, and so, if we can take care of that alone, the pressure on foreign exchange will reduce. The foreign exchange conversion rate, the exchange rate will improve in favour of the Naira.
The Dangote Refinery located in Epe, Lagos, is expected to start producing by 2018, and become fully operational by 2019. This project is seen widely by top policy makers to be the saviour for Nigeria’s forex shortages. Vice President Yemi Osinbajo, and the Governor of the CBN, Mr. Godwin Emefiele have both stated the immense potential of Dangote refinery to be a wealth generator for the country, through foreign exchange earnings.