President Muhammadu Buhari was at the recently concluded Tokyo International Conference on African Development (TICAD VI) which held in Kenya.

The Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu released a statement explaining what Nigeria gained by attending the events.

We’ve taken the statement apart and here are 5 new developments to note from this trip:

Japanese Government had pledged to expend 40 billion dollars to boost the African economies in the next four years.

10 billion dollars of the total will to be injected in the next 12 months while the remaining 30 billion dollars would be expended over a three-year period on areas key to African economies, targeting infrastructures such as roads, energy, ports, hospitals and training institutions. According to Mr Shehu, the Japanese are trying to establish a more influential presence in Africa that their counterparts by investing in areas other than job creation.

The coming of a Presidential Enabling Business Council, PEBEC

In trying to redeem Nigeria’s image as a business and investment friendly destination at the Head of States’ round table meeting with business leaders, President Buhari highlighted the serious efforts his government is making to improve Nigeria’s notoriously bad business environment. He promised that the Council will serve as an inter-ministerial council which will oversee the efforts of government to remove various bottlenecks that stifle business and economic activity to allow for a business friendly-environment and investment climate in Nigeria.

More incentives to encourage Japanese investments in Nigeria

The Nigerian delegation met with several big Japanese companies including the Honda Manufacturing (Nigeria) Limited, representing Honda Motor Co. Ltd; Japan Tobacco Inc., Marubeni Corporation and Mitsubishi Corporation, Toyota Tsusho Corporation (which designed the recently launched solar power plant at the Usuma dam in Abuja), West African Seasoning Co. Ltd., affiliate of Ajinomoto Co. Inc., and Japan External Trade Organization, JETRO’’

According to Shehu, “collectively and individually, these businesses expressed their intention of either coming in newly or expanding their participation in Nigeria’s private sector and so we have started to explore the scope for the incentive packages the Nigerian government would give them to deepen and expand their investments.

KENSA

There’s a new group that has been identified as key industry players within the continent. It is made up of Kenya representing East Africa, Egypt for North Africa, South Africa for the South and Nigeria from West Africa.

An end in sight to grazing crises?

Garba Shehu said that Nigeria and Kenya seized the opportunity of the meeting of their leaders to strengthen bilateral relations and follow up on the achievements of the State Visit to Nairobi by President Buhari, earlier this year.

According to him, while Kenya, having recently discovered oil, is picking lessons from Nigeria’s vast experience in oil and gas and Nigeria on the other hand is learning from the Kenyan experience in managing animal grazing. We can’t wait for the President to start implementing these lessons he’s picke up from Kenya.