Lagos, Jan. 23, 2023 – The Imota Rice Mill to be inaugurated by President Mohammadu Buhari on Tuesday has bright prospects in view of the huge rice consumption in the country.
The mill is the largest rice mill in Africa and the third-largest in the world.
Mr Akin Akeredolu-Ale, the Chief Executive of Lagos Commodities and Futures Exchange (LCFE), made this observation in Lagos on Monday.
He said the estimated consumption of rice by Lagosians alone is one million metric tonnes per annum.
“The Lagos State Government, through the Ministry of Agriculture, saw an opportunity to contribute to driving production to meet this demand by setting up a rice mill.
“The mill will require about 200,000 metric tonnes of paddy rice annually which would result in head rice of about 120,000 metric tonnes.
“Imota rice mill will process paddy rice to head rice and other derivatives and is estimated to generate 1,500 direct jobs and 254,000 indirect jobs,” he said.
Akeredolu-Ale said LCFE was already preparing the ground and building structures for smooth take-off of the mill.
“We have put in place an SEC’s approved framework for the structured supply of paddy rice to the mill through the exchange.
“The exchange will drive the support of the capital market towards the ecosystem and we started this by taking the dealing member firms and stockbrokers of NGX PLC on a factory visit to the mill to see the viability and the opportunities available.
“The capital market operators will generate contracts and financial instruments for rice.
“These contracts will be traded on LCFE as standardised contracts.
“We have spent a considerable amount of time, training and building the capacity of all our registered members.
“The exchange has over one hundred registered members across the capital market and the commodities ecosystem.
“Our goal is to get them to buy into the vision of LCFE and communicate that vision to their clientele,” he said. (GBN)
