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The Manufacturers Association of Nigeria (MAN) has called on the Federal Government to consider local manufacturers in its bailout plan running into billions of Naira in order to salvage the country’s manufacturing job losses and from collapsing in the advent of coronavirus pandemic.
Acting Director-General of MAN, Ambrose Oruche, in a chat in Lagos, disclosed that with the lockdown in the country, without bailout fund or stimulus from government, the country’s manufacturing sector is at risk because of the essential critical role it plays in the economy and contribution to the gross domestic product.
MAN, in its Executive Summary of the economic review for the first half of 2019 showed that an estimated 1,644,392 historical cummulative jobs had over time been created by the sector with millions in workforce.
Oruche explained that the Covid-19 has disrupted the country’s manufacturing sector activities, saying if nothing is done quickly by government in terms of bailout fund to the sector, the fate of millions of workers in the sector is hanging and this will be catastrophic to the country’s economy at large.
Already, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) had an- nounced a N1.1 trillion intervention fund to support critical sectors of the economy, stating that about N1 trillion would be used to support the local manufacturing sector as well as boost import substitution, while the balance of N100 billion would be used to support the health authorities to ensure laboratories, researchers and innovators work with global scientists to patent and produce vaccines and test kits in Nigeria.
Earlier, the MAN acting director-general explained that at present, many local manufacturers cannot have access funds to import raw materials from abroad due to the lockdown in global economy.
He admitted that at this period, it is an essential sub sectors of the manufacturing that need intervention funds, namely, food and beverages, domestic/industrial plastic & rubber, basic metal, iron & steel, chemical & pharmaceutical group and printing, publishing & packag- ing (6Ps) group.
“Yes, we are already in discussion with the Federal Gov- ernment on the issue of bailout fund for manufacturing. I think there should be bailout for local manufacturers like America is giving their companies bailout fund because if you don’t do that, many of them will not comeback after the lockdown and jobs would be lost significantly.
