Mr Glory Onojedo, the Director, Shippers’ Council (NSC), South West Zone says the proposed industrial park to be developed near the Inland Dry Port when completed will be the biggest ever in Nigeria.
This is contained in a statement he personally signed and made available to newsmen on Friday in Ibadan.
A tripartite team of officials from NSC, Nigerian Railway Corporation and Oyo State Government had earlier visited the project site.
Onojedo said that the industrial park was being developed to complement the Ibadan Inland Dry Port promoted by NSC.
He said that NSC and Oyo State Government would soon commence the process for the partition of the parcel of land into industrial plots to facilitate allocation to prospective manufacturing as well as agro processing businesses.
“This industrial park is to be developed on a 50Hectares of land allocated for the purpose by the Oyo state Government at Moniya in Akinyele Local Government Area.
“The industrial park would be allocated to businesses that would manufacture and process agricultural commodities for local consumption and export through the Ibadan Inland Dry Port,” he said.
Onojedo said that the major objective of the inland dry port policy of the federal government was to lower the overall cost of transporting goods to and from the hinterland areas of Nigeria.
According to him, “if cargo are imported through the Ibadan Inland Dry Port and there are no export cargo to take out from there, the cost of transportation will remain high thereby defeating government objectives of establishing the dry ports.
“With manufacturing and agro processing concerns around the Ibadan inland dry port, there will be finished goods and processed agricultural commodities to export thereby lowering the overall cost of transportation on that corridor.”
He noted that manufacturing and agro processing activities at the industrial park would significantly contribute to Nigeria’s gross domestic product, create wealth for people of the south west zone and generate thousands of direct and indirect employment opportunities.
The NSC director said the park was based on a tripartite concept of work, live and leisure, adding there would be industries, residential estates and state of the art leisure facilities.
“With these infrastructure developed separately but complementing one another, the Inland dry port and industrial park will be a place for work, live and leisure, ” he added.
Onojedo also said that public private partnership procurement process to deliver the Ibadan Inland Dry Port was very much on course.
He stated that since the NSC commenced the PPP processes for the Ibadan inland dry port in 2018, much progress has been made and it is at the concluding phase of procurement.
“This has successfully gone through development stage with the preparation of a outline business case which was evaluated and issued with a certificate of compliance by the Infrastructure Concession Regulatory Commission.
“Subsequently, the NSC subjected the project to a rigorous, open, transparent and competitive bidding process which saw to the emergence of a preferred bidder with strong technical capacity and financial capability, ” he said.
Onojedo said that the two stages procurement process recommended by the regulatory authority were adopted, adding it included the request for qualification phase whereby prospective bidders make categorical statement about their technical capacity and financial capabilities.
He said the phase was followed with the request for proposal phase, saying draft full business case and concession agreement are ready for consideration at the soon to be commenced negotiation with the preferred bidder.
“The Ibadan inland dry port is a privately initiated public private partnership project by a Nigerian incorporated Chinese company.
“The dry port is to be developed on a 40Hectares of land at the Ibadan end of the Lagos – Ibadan standard gauge railway line at Olorisa-Oko, Moniya in Akinyele Local Government Area of Oyo State.
“When fully completed, the dry port will have capacity to handle 90,000 twenty feet equivalent units (TEUS) container per annum. The dry port is to be developed in three phases.
“In the first phase, a facility capable of handling 40,000TEUS will be developed. This will then be expanded in the second and final phase to the full capacity,” he said.
Onojedo said that the federal ministry of transportation has constituted a negotiation team, having procured an international firm of transaction advisors to guide the PPP process.
He said that upon conclusion of the negotiation and signing of the concession agreement, the concessionaire would be moved to site with a ground breaking to signal the commencement of construction phase.
Ibadan inland dry port has been lauded by maritime stakeholders for its potentials to decongest the Lagos ports, free the metropolis of trucks and ease traffic on the Lagos–Ibadan expressway.
The standard gauge railway line will be the major mode of freighting containers to the ports which is located at the terminal end of the rail line.
