President Muhammadu Buhari has announced the federal government’s plan to jettison kerosene consumption by 2030 when gas supply would have been total.
Buhari made the pronouncement in Abuja at the opening ceremony of the 15th Annual Banking and Finance Conference organised by the Chartered Institute of Bankers of Nigeria (CIBN).
Represented by the Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning Mrs Zainab Ahmed, President Buhari emphasised that long-term greenhouse emissions have resulted in hotter temperatures, more severe rainstorms, increased drought and food security issues.
“To tackle this issue, the government has set plans in motion to significantly reduce greenhouse emissions from Nigeria. More specifically, by 2030, we aim to eliminate kerosene lighting as well as short-lived pollutants in the oil and gas sector,” he said.
On the raging inflation across the globe, he attributed the scary inflation figures across the world to fast-rising consumer demand in a world that was yet to fully recover from the COVID-19 pandemic, and is now facing the Russia-Ukraine war.
Speaking to the theme of the conference, “Repositioning the Financial Services Industry for an Evolving Glocal Context,” the President noted that “in the new ‘Glocal’, repositioning the finance services industry involves valuable innovations to ensure global solutions reach local indigenous customers.”
In repositioning itself, President Buhari urged the finance sector to “serve not just as an intermediary for lenders and borrowers but in creating a new ecosystem consisting of platforms where ordinary Africans can buy and sell their locally made products despite currency disparity as being practised on the Pan-African Payment and Settlement System (PAPSS), a brainchild of Afrexim Bank.”