NACCIMA pushes for technology transfer to drive SMEs

As Nigeria faces economic challenges occasioned by dwindling oil prices, the Nigerian Association  of Chambers  of  Commerce, Industry, Mines and Agriculture (NACCIMA) says small scale industries will last  longer in business  once investors give attention to technology transfer.
The chamber adds that this will help to further address the needs of the local industries.

Bassey Edem, president, NACCIMA, made this position known on the sideline of the Nigeria-Turkish Business forum held in Abuja, which had 150 Business Turkish businessmen discussing business strategies with their Nigerian counterparts.

“We will appreciate more of foreign investments, but for now, what is happening is that the infrastructure in the country is not very well developed, and an investor from outside who wants to come in will like to first of all see what the local investor is going through,” he said.

He pointed out that if the local investor was going through a lot of challenges and there were no indications that these challenges would be solved, the foreign investor could stay back.

“What we are saying is that look, we in NACCIMA are asking the government to tackle challenges of the local investors. It is these investors here that are going to talk to external investors. For example, the Turkish people are here to invest, and they are talking business to business to Nigerian partners. If Nigeria partners say, look, we are not happy with what is happening in this country, other investors will run away. We are saying that the Nigerian government should be able to solve the challenges of the Nigerian investors in terms of infrastructure like roads, power, so that we can compete effectively with our foreign investors,” he further said.

On incentives for  attracting investment inflow into Nigeria, Edem said, “There are lots of incentives for businesses here, like tax holidays. The problem is being able to run some of them. For instance,  the government is aware that there is a need to push funding into a lot of businesses, so, it set up what is called intervention funds in agriculture,  industry, mining, such that people can draw on and run their business,” he added.

Harrison Edeh