FG earned N52bn from solid minerals in 2017 – NEITI

The solid minerals sector contributed N52.75 billion to federation revenue in 2017, a 21 percent increase on the N43.22 billion contributed by the sector in 2016.

The information and data followed an independent reconciliation of company payments and government receipts in the sector by the Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (NEITI) in its latest report released in Abuja.

Details of the report made available to newsmen by NEITI spokesman, Dr Orji Ogbonnaya Orji, said that from the sector’s total revenue contribution of N52.75billion, payments to the Federal Inland Revenue Service accounted for N49.162 billion which is about 93% of the total revenues realized during the period under review.

Payments to the Mines Inspectorate Department (MID) and Mining Cadastre Office amounted to N1.59billion and N2.08billion or about 3% and 4% respectively of the total revenue from the sector.

NEITI however noted that “Except for revenue from MID, there was significant increase in revenue from all other streams” in 2017.

According to NEITI, “A trend analysis of the revenue flows showed that there has been a very remarkable increase in revenue accruing to the Federation from the solid minerals sector from 2013 to 2017, though 2016 witnessed a decrease of 31.02% compared to 2015.”

Other revenue flows from the solid minerals according to the NEITI report, include subnational payments. These are direct payments to states and local governments as a result of national laws, contractual obligations or local regulations which are disclosed as unilateral disclosures by the extractive companies. “The total payment was 2.877 billion representing about 5.45% of total government revenue from the sector”, NEITI stated.

On production, the NEITI Solid Minerals Report disclosed that 35.33 million metric tons of minerals valued at N32.78 billion was produced in Nigeria during the same period. “The production data was based on minerals either used or sold during the year”.

A breakdown of the production showed that Limestone, Granite and Laterite accounted for 85.72% of the total minerals produced with Limestone alone contributing about 55% of the production volumes. However, in value terms, Granite and Limestone contributed 37.28% and 35.57% respectively.

On state-by-state contribution, the report highlighted that Ogun State produced the highest quantity of minerals in terms of both volume and value. “The state accounted for over one-third of total production quantity and 23% of the total minerals production value. The contributions by Ogun and Kogi states put together accounted for over half of the total production quantity.”