$6bn Annual Trade Value: Dutch investors eye Nigeria’s ICT, Solar-energy, Agric, Healthcare sectors
…We are equipping young Nigerians to meet industry demands — Govt
By Moses Adeniyi
To further boast the value of bilateral trade with Nigeria, the Dutch government has disclosed that it is galvanising more efforts to attract Dutch investors to optimise more market opportunities in key sectors of the Nigerian economy.
The Dutch government, it was gathered has identified key interest in areas of opportunities which include Information and Communication Technology (ICT), Agriculture, Healthcare and Solar-energy sectors which its nationals can leverage on in the Nigerian market.
The Consul General of the Kingdom of Netherlands in Lagos, Mr. Michel Deelen, disclosed this at the New Year’s Reception of the Consulate in Lagos, held as part of activities to unveil the 2023 plans of the Consulate.
Deelen who spoke at the event hinting Dutch nationals of the areas of opportunities in the Nigerian market, said they are aware of the challenges, but the Consulate is doing more to expand the presence of Dutch investors to leverage on opportunities in the Nigerian market
“Nigeria has a lot of business opportunities. We all know that its a huge market and it’s a market that also needs a lot of products, that can be produced locally, but sometimes need input from international import.
“So, we are supporting companies to invest in Nigeria – whether that’s Dutch companies, whether that’s other international companies – to link them up with Nigerian companies to basically produce over here.
“We all know the challenges, but we are still here and we are even expanding our presence here because we can see a lot of opportunities in the field of agriculture, in the field of healthcare, in the field of solar, and in the field of ICT. Those are basically our priority areas and we bring Dutch companies to Nigeria to work together with Nigerian companies to develop markets,” he said.
“These are the plans for this year, we want to have what we call the impact clusters on solar, healthcare, ICT, and on agric,” Deelen told NewsDirect.
He disclosed that the Dutch government seeks to expand the bilateral trade between the Netherlands and Nigeria which according to him “is an average of $6billion, a year, that is import and export, that has put us on the third place as Nigeria’s trading partner.”
Speaking to NewsDirect on the forth coming election, the Consul-General who said as a Consulate they would not take a side with any party or candidate, wished that the outcome of the election would produce the best candidates to form the next government for Nigeria’s development.
“We are very happy that Nigeria is a democracy and every democracy has elections every four years, so we pray that the elections would happen in a peaceful and constructive way. Whoever may win, I hope that would be the best person for Nigeria’s development,” he said.
He disclosed that the Consulate has lined up capacity building programmes for young Nigerians in 2023 to enhance their skills to meet up with industry demands.
“We have a number of incubators and start-up programmes whereby we support young Nigerians. We do trainings and help them with starting up their own business and so and so. That is basically in which way we try to help young Nigerians.
“We are going to establish technical and vocational training programmes this year and that will also contribute to sought of schooling young Nigerians, to make them fit for what companies are demanding in terms of skills,” Deelen said.
