Govt hands over $1.8m KOICA rice mill to private firm

The Niger State government has signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Elephant Group PLC for the concessioning of the $1.8 million Korea International Cooperation Agency (KOICA) rice mill as part of effort to increase rice production and the revenue base of state.

Daily Trust Saturday reports that the 2.5 ton per hour capacity rice mill which was established at the cost of over $1.8 million and commissioned in December 2016 has not been in use since then.

Signing the MoU in Minna, the Commissioner for Agriculture and Rural Development, Zakari Haliru Jikantoro explained that after commissioning the mill, the state government considered the need to ensure concrete arrangements for the sustainable operation and management of the mill to justify the enormous investment made, hence the decision to concession it.

Jikantoro who said that the concession period was 10 years, stated that other terms of the concession of the mill include an annual concession rate of N25 million and periodic monitoring of the mill by a joint team of representatives of the federal and state ministries of Agriculture, KOICA-Nigeria office and the Elephant Group PLC.