The Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA) has said it was working to ensure that every sector of local maritime industry is productive in order to boost the nation’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP).
Beginning with a very robust cabotage trading through vessel acquisition by local ship owners and availability of cargoes for them to lift, the Director-General of the agency,
Dr Dayo Mobereola said on Monday in Lagos at a media interaction that the agency under his administration would work to raise maritime industry’s contribution to the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP).
Mobereola added that under his leadership, NIMASA would develop Nigeria’s blue economy and threw light on several burning issues in the nation’s maritime industry, explaining that attention were being paid on seafarers capacity development, vessels acquisition, Cabotage Vessels Financing Fund (CVFF), security and safety on the waters.
He noted that the significant foreign exchange could be earned by Nigeria from seafarers exportation, adding that proper capacity development for local seafarers was not negotiable.
He noted: “I am aware of the benefits of seafarers in the Philippines where seafarers repatriate $26 billion to the country annually. Their seafarers are not better humans than our own. It is a matter of good training.
Many countries are looking for good seafarers and we don’t want to send out half-baked seafarers. We are working on it.”
Also, he stressed that the country needs to improve on what the maritime industry was contributing to the GDP, adding that the agency intends to achieve this by a set of enforcements including deployment of the modular floating dock, seeking the appropriate and relevant trainings for cadets and boosting cabotage trade.
Mobereola added: “We are reviewing the process of how vessels crew are being engaged. We are also working to ensure that the cadets we produce under the National Seafarers Development Programme (NSDP) are good products after training. All these issues are on our table. There’s no single day we don’t deliberate on them.
“We have many proposals on the table but we want to make sure that a good decision is reached on it. We want to put it on use as soon as possible. It will create employment for our trained cadets, earn revenue and improve the sector, but we want to do it right.
On the issue of CVFF, the director general explained that the fund was safe with the Federal Government, stressing that the agency was looking out for the right opportunity for its disbursement in a sustainable manner that would ensure that only those actively playing in the industry gets it.
According to him, “there are many considerations in the disbursement of CVFF.These factors are not only within Nigeria but international factors and there has to be cargo for the vessels to lift after they have been acquired.”