Senate President Godswill Akpabio has said Nigeria cannot continue to export its raw minerals without adding value.
Akpabio said that at least 30 percent of local value addition must be obtained from any raw minerals mined from Nigeria before they can be exported.
Naija News reports that the Senate President stated this on Tuesday at the maiden raw materials summit with the theme: “Shaping the Future of Africa’s Resource Landscape”.
Represented by the Chairman Senate Committee on Science and Technology, Senator Aminu Abbas, Akpabio called for an end to what he described as the colonial legacy of Africa supplying raw minerals, while others innovate using the same raw minerals.
He emphasized that the National Assembly is very committed to putting a total stop to the practice through its 30 Percent Minimum Value-Addition Bill.
The former Governor of Akwa-Ibom explained that the bill was not intended to stifle trade; rather, it was designed to ignite domestic enterprise, create jobs, attract capital, and build resilient value chains that benefit our people.
“It is in this spirit that I reaffirm our full legislative backing for the 30 percent Minimum Value-Addition Bill, currently under consideration. This groundbreaking bill mandates that no raw material of Nigerian origin shall be exported without undergoing a minimum of 30 percent local value addition, whether through processing, refining, packaging, or industrial transformation.
“This extractive model fuelled by colonial legacies and sustained by global asymmetries must now give way to a new paradigm rooted in local processing, regional integration, and sovereign economic vision.
“We must reject the historic pattern in which Africa merely supplies inputs while others reap the benefits of innovation, branding, and global market control. The future of Africa lies not beneath our soil but in what we do with what lies beneath. And what we do must be backed by law, driven by policy, and sustained by enterprise.
“Our task is to empower African entrepreneurs, SMEs, cooperatives, and young innovators who will turn mineral wealth into exportable machinery, agro-resources into packaged goods, and research into revenue.
“We invite African pension funds, sovereign wealth institutions, and multilateral development banks to direct capital into processing infrastructure, industrial parks, and green energy corridors linked to our raw materials.
“We are drafting laws to support climate-smart mining, regenerative manufacturing, and the circular economy. This is our commitment not as a gesture, but as a generational mandate,” he said.
On his part, the Minister of Innovation, Science and Technology, Uche Nnaji, said Africa would no longer send its raw minerals out of the continent.
Nnaji disclosed that the ministry is deploying digital tools, traceability infrastructure, and research-to-industry pathways to strengthen intra-African trade under the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA).
“This is how Africa moves from extraction to transformation from potential to prosperity. Let this summit send a clear message: Africa will no longer export its future in raw form. Our minerals will power industries, our crops will feed global markets, and our youth will drive innovation,” he stated.