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Solid Minerals Overview
Digging deep for Nigeria’s second wealth
Mining continues to dominate that dubious category of Nigeria’s ‘second tier’ of industrial endeavour. Dwarfed by the contribution of oil to the nation’s GDP (3% of the world’s oil supplies come from Africa’s most populous nation) the solid minerals sector has been characterised more by its economic potential than its ability to deliver tangible wealth in recent years.
It was not always like this. Before the discovery of oil and gas it was solid minerals that largely sustained the Nigerian economy, coal and tin being among those natural resources being mined and exported on a scale unthinkable today. But poor management by state-owned enterprises, compounded by corruption and an altogether incoherent exploitation of the nation’s undoubted yet hitherto largely inaccessible mineral riches, have thwarted efforts to develop the industry.
International blue-chip mining companies have given it a wide berth, but its underperformance in recent years, which President Yar’Adua’s administration puts down to neglect, maladministration and simple lack of technical expertise, could be coming to an end. The price of regeneration in the solid minerals sector, however, could be high; very high indeed. If Nigeria is to achieve its aim of being one of the top 20 world economies by 2020, it would need to inject up to USD10 billion a year into the industry for the next decade, according to some reports.
