Mr Olumoh Sharafdeen, the Technical Secretary, Abuja branch of the Nigerian Society of Engineers (NSE), has called on the Federal Government to diversify the oil economy into trade and tourism sector development.
Sharafdeen, who led a delegation of the branch on an International Technical Visit (ITV) to the United Arab Emirate (UAE), made this call on Wednesday in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria in Abuja.
He said that the ITV was an annual programme of the branch, aimed at creating a platform for knowledge sharing with other countries of the world.
Sharafdeen said the call followed the practice in UAE and other developed countries of the world that had succeeded in diversifying their economy from oil to trade and tourism.
“From the information given to us, revenue from oil in Dubai just accounts for three per cent while trade and tourism account for more than 80 per cent of the country’s revenue.
“When they had oil boom, they diversified their economy and now they have the tallest building in the world, the only seven-star hotel and many other wonderful edifices.
“We spend most of our income in Nigeria to develop other economies because we are always on either health or medical tourism in other countries,” he said.
According to him, for tourism, Nigeria has all it takes to develop the sector because we have natural waters while in Dubai, they create artificial lakes.
He blamed the current agitations in the country on failure of government to diversify the economy and the sole reliance on oil.
“The government should look away from oil; it has been the cause of the problem in the country because of how to share the oil money.
“This recession has opened the eyes of Nigerians to see that the country has unsustainable source of income, we cannot continue to live on oil alone,” he added. (NAN)