Minister of Mines and Steel Development, Architect Olamilekan Adegbite has assured that many people of the North-East subregion including women in mining will benefit from the operations of the newly commissioned Kaolin processing plant in Bauchi.
Fielding questions from journalists shortly after he commissioned the multi-million Naira Kaolin processing plant sited in Bagurja, Gwaram, Alkaleri LGA of Bauchi State, the Minister assured that the Federal Government will continue to involve women in the process of empowerment.
Reacting to the observation that there were no women among the beneficiaries of the empowerment programme of the Ministry, he said that, “Sincerely, these are not all the beneficiaries of the empowerment programme, because per sector like this, we have over 100 beneficiaries in each of the Sectors we have, this is the 4th in the series and so, not everyone can come out today.”
Olamilekan Adegbite added that, “Somebody made a joke of it earlier on, that maybe because the climate here is so harsh, that was why we don’t have many women come out, but that is not it, you saw women in mining made a speech, I want to assure you that women are well represented though they are not one of the people who stood in the sun here today, but they are well represented.”
An excited Minister said that, “The Capacity of this plant is about 40 tons per hour. That means more people will be fully engaged in the process in order to meet the target, this translate to employment.”
Asked if it will add to the Federation account in terms of revenue generation, the Minister said that, “It is not so much about what goes into the federation account, this is going to be a value chain that will create wealth for people, it is not about much money that comes to government, the Federal government did this not to earn money but to expand the Sector.”
He stressed that, “We have a domestication policy to enhancing it. If you are selling raw Kaolin and then you are processing it, the price differential is exponential, if you are earning N60,000 in selling raw, you could be making about N6m for the same weight, that is the difference.”
According to him,”Here, they will be processing and selling, this is also a demonstration for other entrepreneurs, that, this is possible and they can also do it. The output from here annually cannot satisfy the local market, you heard what they said, the pharmaceutical industry use the wet Kaolin to be processed here, but you have the ceramic industry, paint industry, cosmetics who use the dry one, this does not produce dry, so there is room for other people to even invest in the processing plant.”
“But, what the Federal Government has done within its capacity, is to provide this demonstration plants which are not the ultimate, we have Kaolin all over the North-East subregion, so, other people can bring in equipment even bigger ones within the cluster and then process,” he said.
Olamilekan Adegbite stressed that the benefit of the programme by the Federal Government grant ultimately is that,”We are expanding the Sector, we are going to save a lot of foreign exchange, pharmaceutical industry will no longer import Kaolin, paint industry, ceramic industry, cosmetics will buy locally to save foreign exchange, will create wealth within that chain and everybody is happier with it.”
On the law baning the exportation of raw Ore, he said that Nigerians in the mining industry are aware of the law banning exportation of crude Ore,”if you are working legally in Nigeria under the law, you must come to the Ministry to get permit.”
According to him, “Now, what we are doing is that, the domestication policy has been passed since November 2021 but because capacity is still growing in that sector, if you come to us for an export permit and we realize that what you want to export in the raw form, we have capacity to develop it in Nigeria, we would not allow that, but like I said, this is an invitation for entrepreneurs businesses from within Nigeria and outside to come and invest.”
The Minister concluded that,”you don’t have to get involved in mining, there are a lot of people who produce raw Ore and because we are saying that you can’t export in that raw form, they either sell to people who will process or give it to processors for a fee and then they export themselves. It is a win win game for everybody.”
