Roche group, an Irish investor says it is willing to partner Abia State on construction, oil and gas and agriculture.
Speaking while on a courtesy call on Governor Alex Otti, the Chief Executive Officer of Roche Company, Mr Ian Roche explained that the group has concessionig rights in Africa with requisite knowledge in oil palm business, construction and oil and gas sectors, stressing that partnering Abia will bring huge benefits to the state.
Also speaking, the leader of the delegation, Cosmas Madugba explained that the Roche group is a holding company involved in construction, oil and gas and agriculture with activities in over 20 countries, disclosing that their visit was to interface with the government to add value to the state.
Responding, the Abia State Governor, Alex Otti expressed optimism that the state will rank among the largest oil palm producing areas in the globe by the time his government is through with what it is doing in that sector .
Otti said the company wouldn’t have come at a better time, revealing that only last weekend, a Belgian group was also in the state for the concesioning of palm settlements in the state, stating that his government wants to level all the old palm trees and replace them with high yielding ones.
“I believe that this is the time we want to do something about it. As you rightly identified we have a lot of them (palm estates). The one in Ohambele is expandable. It’s not just Ohambele, but all that area can actually be turned into palm settlements.The one at Abam and the Ulonna that you mentioned and several other places even around here. We have the vegetation that grows palm,” the governor explained,
Governor Otti assured that his government is open to partnership and collaborations even as it believes in creating the right environment that will grow businesses, and informed the group that Abia as an oil producing state with large reserve of gas will want to work with it and urged it to consider the Abia Innovation and Industrial park as a suitable location for their business.
“The issue of gas has been liberalized so we also want to work with you in that area. We set up last year an innovation and industrial park. You may also want to have a look at it to see if it’s a place you may want to locate and the advantage of that place is that you will be sitting on top of gas and because you are sitting on top of gas,you are guaranteed when everything comes on stream you get energy at very very reasonable cost,” Otti said.
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