James Sowole in Abeokuta
The Ogun State Governnent, has created six economic development clusters in three senatorial districts of the state as parts of efforts to attract more investors to do business in the state and raise its Internally Generated Revenue (IGR).
Commissioner for Finance and Chief Economic Adviser to the Governor, Mr. Dapo Okunbadejo, disclosed this at a cocktail, organised by the State Internal Revenue Service (OGIRS), for companies and institutions operating in the state.
The event, which held in Abeokuta, had in attendance, representatives of companies and institutions that were referred to as tax agents.
The companies included Honda Manufacturing Company, Federated Steel Mill Limited, Dangote Cement Transport Limited, First Bank, CCECC Nigeria Limited, Dangote Cement, Crescent University, Chrilan University, Ballin Transport and Logistics, Nestle Plc, Wema Bank, Federal Polytechnic Ilaro.
The clusters, according to the commissioner, were established in Ijebu Ode, Remo, Magboro, Abeokuta and Imeko areas of the state.
Okubadejo, who said the clusters, that were created for the first time in the state, could be likened to Industrial Estate, explained that the new initiative, was much bigger than normal industrial estate.
“We have six economic development clusters across the state. They are well balanced to take advantage of the peculiarities of those locations and where we are spending significant resources in infrastructure.
“The first one is Ijebu Economic Development Cluster, which is around Ijebu Epe new tolll road we have just constructed. This will have a lot of cities in there, including medical city, automobile city, knowledge city, smart city, MSME Park and the hub financial centre,” the commissioner said.
He disclosed that in some of the cities, there were about 10,000 hectares of industrial estatesas there would also be residential estates as well.
“We are currently master planning these clusters such that we can easily attract those industrial concerns in those places. We also have the aerotropolis in the Remo Cluster. The aerotropolis, in a nutshell, is simply called an airport city, where you carefully planned the real estate around the airport that would cater for other commercial concerns such as logistics and distribution.
“So, companies that actually have their warehouses there such as light manufacturing would also be near there so that people can produce and export. So, it is a whole city and that city is properly planned. The location of this agro cargo airport is one that is easily accessible.
It is right at the intersection between Lagos-Ibadan Expressway and Shagamu- Benin Expressway. So, there can’t be better accessibility than that as even the Lagos Airport is at a dead end,” the commissioner said.
Okubadejo said the Magboro Economic Development Cluster, had huge expanse of land that was currently being developed to an industrial estate.
He said with the creation of these clusters, the state could easily take advantage of African Continental Freeze Trade Agreement, that is, essentially making the whole Africa a single largest economic bloc in the world.
He said if the state could take advantage of the hub as the leading economic hub in Nigeriaand attract a lot more industries, adding that, with the creation of these economic develolment clusters, companies could come easily into the state and establish business.
“If these companies take land in these clusters, they can develop their factories and industries and we can begin to charge taxes giving that we have limited capacity for PAYE,”he said.
Chairman of the Ogun State Internal Revenue Services, Mr Olugbenga Olaleye, while speaking at the event, said government had created enabling environment to encourage ease of doing business, which has increased revenue accrued to the state.
His words: “As at the half of this year, we have done N54 billion of our IGR by third quarter of this year; we have done N74 billion already and by the end of this year by the grace of God, if we are not doing 100 billion, we will be very close to it.
“By this feat, this will be the first in the history of this state that we are very proud about, because we are doing it in a very methodical way, puting in place all our policy framework, reforms, digitisation that promote accountability and transparency.”
