Nigeria to inaugurate home-made Barite

The Minister of Mines and Steel Development Mr Olamilekan Adegbite says the Ministry is set to inaugurate made in Nigeria Barite as part of an effort to prioritize and develop seven strategic minerals in the Mining Roadmap.

He made the statement when he received delegations from the Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (NEITI), led by the Executive Secretary, Ogbonnaya Orji.

According to him, the Ministry has succeeded in achieving the development of barite from extraction, milling, and bagging stages to support local industries, as well as for export, adding that Nigeria bagged barite has “Proudly Nigeria’ as its logo.

Adegbite, while acknowledging the impressive contribution of NEITI in ensuring transparency and accountability in the sector, stated that the Ministry is working at updating and upgrading its ICT infrastructure to enable it to link the 10 agencies in the Ministry to ensure that all data of royalties paid and funds received would be properly monitored and uploaded to the Ministry’s server for online accessibility.

Earlier, the Secretary, Nigeria Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (NEITI), Ogbonnaya Orji said the purpose of the visit was to deepen the relationship with the Ministry and share data that would enable the organisation to report accurately and transparently the activities in the sector.

He noted that sharing information and data with NEITI would attract investors as well as build confidence in the mining sector.

He, therefore, requested that the Ministry’s website be uploaded regularly to enable would-be investors to get the right information from the Ministry’s web page.