Strive to be Africa’s food power house—Bray tells Nigerians

&NewLine;<p>John Bray&comma; the U&period;S&period; Consul General in Lagos has urged Nigerians to&NewLine;stive to become Africa’s food power house as against oil power house by leveraging&NewLine;&nbsp&semi;on its vast agricultural potential to&NewLine;create wealth and boost its economy&period; <&sol;p>&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;<p>Bray said this on Friday in Lagos during the African Food and&NewLine;Products Conference and Exhibition &lpar;AFPE&rpar; with the theme&comma; &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;Sustainability and&NewLine;Innovation&colon; Pathway to Business Success for SMEs’’ organized by&NewLine;Nigerian-American Chamber of Commerce&period;&period; <&sol;p>&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;<p>Bray represented by Brent Omdahl&comma; Commercial Counselor&comma; U&period;S&period;&NewLine;Commercial Service&comma; said that the world knew Nigeria as an oil country not as&NewLine;an agriculture rich nation&period; &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;The task before Nigeria is to show the world its&NewLine;enormous potential in agriculture&period; &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;Nigeria needs to use agriculture to create&NewLine;wealth&comma; employment and grow its economy&comma; U&period;S&period; is doing that and Nigeria can do&NewLine;that too&period; <&sol;p>&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;&NewLine;<p>&OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;In the next 50 years&comma; what produce will be known around the world as a signature product from Nigeria&period; &OpenCurlyDoubleQuote;Would it be shea butter&comma; tiger nut&comma; cashew or palm oil&semi; Nigeria has the comparative advantage in these produce and more and should explore it the same way the U&period;S&period; explored cranberry potential to create wealth&comma;” he said&period; Also&comma; Mr&period;Abubakar Suleiman&comma; Managing Director&comma; Sterling Bank&comma; said that achieving sustainable growth in the country was about the ability to reduce poverty&comma; boost employment and improve citizen’s welfare&period; Suleiman&comma; represented by Mr&period;ShinaAtilola&comma; Divisional Head&comma; Retail and Consumer Banking&comma; Sterling Bank&comma; said that any initiative or policy that did not lead to employment creation would not catalyse development&period; According to him&comma; Sterling Bank is using innovation to facilitate seamless and quick access to finance for Small and Medium Enterprises toward aiding their sustainable business growth&period; He said that many SMEs were using innovation to drive their businesses&comma; expressing optimism that Nigerian businesses would in the nearest future proffer solutions to the world’s food challenge&period; Earlier&comma; OtunbaOluwatoyinAkomolafe&comma; National President&comma; Nigerian-American Chamber of Commerce &lpar;NACC&rpar;&comma; said that the chamber sought to utilize AFPE to improve profitability and sustainable global competitiveness for Nigerian SMEs&period; Akomolafe said that innovation was crucial to achieving a strong organizational structure and robust economic growth&period; He said that Nigeria’s futuristic economic growth could not be sustained with oil revenue but continued investment and attractive policies to aid growth of SMEs<&sol;p>&NewLine;