The Bayelsa State Government has concluded plans to employ no fewer than 30,000 workers, especially indigenes, in its $3.5bn fertiliser and petrochemical company, the Bayelsa State Development and Investment Corporation, has said.
Disclosing this in an interview with journalists in Yenogoa on Wednesday, the Deputy Managing Director, BDIC, Mr. Tam Alazigha, said the $3.5bn Brass Fertilizer and Petrochemical project to be sited at Odioma in Brass Local Government Area is expected to generate a turnover of $1.5bn.
According to Alazigha, the state is in for a prosperous future as the corporation has intensified action on restructuring the state economy and expanding economic opportunities, adding that the new offices that were opened in South Africa, United Kingdom and Atlanta and the United States, would “take Bayelsa to the world and bring the world to Bayelsa”.
Speaking further, he said the development would open outposts in strategic locations in the various key markets in order to leverage on opportunities that the markets offered to drive the restoration of the Bayelsa economy.
He said: “The $3.5bn Brass Fertilizer and Petrochemical project at Odioma, which is expected to generate a turnover of $1.5bn will employ about 30,000 Bayelsans. This high-impact catalytic project is expected to produce 5,000 metric tonnes of Methanol per day, 2,200 metric tonnes per day of Ammonia and 7,700 metric tonnes per day of Urea for domestic and export markets.
“This humongous project will ensure availability of high-grade fertilizer for farmers throughout the planting season and meet 25 per cent of the country’s projected annual domestic demand of 10 million metric tonnes. The BDIC is to take up a 10 per cent equity stake in the project.
“The only property owned by the corporation are those in the U.K, located at St. John’s Wood registered under BDIC UK Ltd and forms part of the assets in the balance sheet of the corporation. The property was bought at £2.3m but now valued at over £3m with a monthly rental income of £7,000. For the office in the United States, the property was purchased in BIDC’s name in 2013 for $ 850,000 and was leased as a property with a monthly income of $5,000.”
Alazigha further listed other achievements to include the $300m Liquefied Petrochemical Gas project at Agge, with a projected turnover of $100m and which would produce butane or cooking gas and ongoing serious negotiation with Microsoft and Goggle to facilitate deployment of the much vaunted white space technology in the state to make internet available in the rural areas and hence build businesses.
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