Foreign Direct Investments (FDIs) in Nigeria have hit US$35 billion, up from US$22 billion in 2002, the Executive Secretary of the Nigeria Investment Promotion Commission (NIPC), Mustapha Bello, said in a published interview here Monday.
Of the amount, China alone accounts for US$10 billion, up from US$26 million in 1999.
Bello said in the interview, with the private Thisday newspaper, that most of the FDIs came from the oil and gas as well as the telecommunications sector.
“Even going by the CBN (Central Bank of Nigeria) records, it (the FDI inflow) is an average of US$2 to US$3 billion a year. But if we are able to fast-track our growth to a target of 10 per cent, we must be able to derive a minimum of US$3 billion a year,” he said.
The NIPC boss said the country would experience a faster FDI growth rate if it could focus more on the non-oil sector.
“If we get more into the non-oil (sector) which is the target of the government now, then we would even see much faster growth because what the investment of US$5 million in the non-oil sector will do, that of US$50 million in the oil and gas will not do, because US$5 million investment in the non-oil and gas should be able to create at least 500 jobs,” Bello added.