Nigeria needs to invest more in other sectors to achieve diversification – Gov Bagudu

Kebbi State Governor, Atiku Bagudu has advocated heavy investment in other sectors of the nation’s economy if the much talked about diversification of the economy from oil and gas must be a reality.

Bagudu spoke Monday at a public hearing on a bill for an Act to establish the Nigerian economic diversification council organised by the Senate Committee on National Planning and Economic Affairs.

The governor, who is a former senator said Nigeria is a blessed nation in all sense of the world and “we need to support different sectors of Nigeria, we need to support different constituents of Nigeria to do better.

“We have done well in petroleum and gas not because it is the only sector, but that is where we put in the most money. Maybe we have put, on an average basis between 1990 to 2010, which have been investing about 10 billion dollars in petroleum and gas when I say we, it is both public and private sectors”.

According to him “if you measure how much has been going into agriculture, for example, in that period, maybe, it is less than 500 million dollars.”

He said it will not be surprising that the outcome will be different, adding, “may be if we take mining, whether it is gold, which every state has something to offer, again may be we have not invested as much