Nigeria has refined eligibility criteria for granting pioneer status on industries and would subject the scheme to a biennial review, according to Yewande Sadiku, Executive Secretary of the government’s investment and promotion council, NIPC. The reform has been given seal of approval by the Federal Executive Council (FEC) which has also to add 27 new industries to the existing club of eligible sectors, while removing two – petroleum, as well as cement from the existing list. The deletion of petroleum will take immediate effect, while in the case of cement, this will become operational in three years.

Sadiku said in an interview in Abuja, that companies that would enjoy pioneer status were only those that ventured to invest in industries that were either non-existent at all, or in which the country did not have sufficient presence for its economic development. “Pioneer status does not relate to only new industries or entrants to the economy,” Sadiku noted.