By Omotayo Edubi
The Minister of Mines and Steel Development, Olamilekan Adegbite, says Nigeria has insufficient geosciences data, which has limited investments in the mining sector across the county.
Adegbite disclosed this in Abuja on Tuesday at the stakeholders’ validation exercise on the field research in the areas of mining engineering, metallurgy and mineral processing, geological mapping, industrial and minerals utilisation/exports, and energy minerals.
He, said efforts are ongoing by the Federal Government to ensure the availability of this data in order to promote mining investments and operations in the country.
He added that N142.6m was shared among 14 tertiary institutions in Nigeria to conduct research on mineral deposits.
According to the Minister, the sum was shared among the beneficiary institutions for research development in various areas relating to mapping and evaluation of particular mineral deposits.
He said, “You will all agree with me that, without data, there can be no serious mining activities. Nigeria lacks adequate bankable geosciences data needed to attract major mining companies to invest in the sector.
“The Ministry, therefore, has made data generation, retrieval and storage a priority and would continue to invest hugely in this area. In this regard, the sum of N142.6m was shared among 14 beneficiaries for research development in various areas relating to mapping and evaluation of particular mineral deposits, which we believe will no doubt increase the fountain of Geosciences data available for investors.”
The minister further said that the institutions that benefitted from the research grants were carefully selected by an independent faculty of erudite professors.
“The institutions that benefited from these research grants were carefully selected by independent faculty of five erudite professors of proven integrity who contributed to the growth and development of the sector.” He said.
The tertiary institutions that participated in the exercise included the University of Ibadan, University of Lagos, University of Port Harcourt, University of Jos, Ebonyi State University, Nasarawa State University, and the Kaduna Polytechnic.
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