By Business A.M.
Olamilekan Adegbite, the minister of mines and steel development, has expressed optimism that Nigeria will no longer spend over $300 million annually on the importation of processed barite for the oil sector, following the establishment of a N1 billion 10-tonne-per-hour barite processing plant in Cross River State.
Adegbite, who stated this recently during the commissioning of the barite processing plant in Ugaga community of Yala LGA, Cross River State, described the development as a game changer for the solid minerals and oil sectors of the economy.
According to the minister, Nigeria was losing lots of value every year as the raw barite ore which is abundant in the country was being processed abroad rather than locally. The minister stated further that Nigeria has a 4.8 gravity standard of barite in vast quantities which is far higher than the 4.2 found elsewhere
This, he explained, encouraged his ministry to launch the project of establishing the barite processing plant in November 2021 in Port Harcourt, Rivers State. He added that the barite processing plant was one of the cluster projects the ministry embarked upon as supported by President Muhammadu Buhari to diversify the economy.
Commenting on the choice of Ugaga as a location for the barite processing plant, the minister said the decision is predicated on its possession of rich deposits of barite among the South South states and its closeness to Port Harcourt, Rivers state where the processed barites are demanded for oil exploration in line with local content and value addition policy in Nigeria.
Speaking further, he said; “The informal trading of unprocessed barite leads to revenue and job losses. It is, therefore, in a bid to develop the downstream sector of the mining industry to improve product pricing, create jobs, improve revenue generation and attract foreign markets to Nigeria that the barite processing plant was established.”
The Minister said that with the location of the barite processing plant in Ugaga, artisanal and small-scale barite miners within the zone can easily have access to the plant for their barite processing before further transportation and sales.
He added that the concept of the barite processing plant was a carefully crafted policy to spur job creation and capacity development for barite miners in Cross River State and its environs.
The plant, he said, will create over 20,000 jobs in the barite mining value chain in the South-South zone cluster.
Oluwatoyin Akinlade, the permanent secretary in the ministry, remarked that the outcome of the barite ore processing Plant here in Ugaga was part of the measures by the Buhari regime to address the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.
Akinlade added that the facility will process barite to the international API standards for export to other parts of the world in order to generate foreign exchange.
On his part,Yunusa Mohammed, the director of the artisanal and small-scale department, said artisanal barite miners in parts of northern Cross River State in their clusters will now process the resource at the plant for greater wealth addition.
Mohammed said in due time, there will be an expansion of the local economy through the presence of the plant.
