Economy
Tony Elumelu, GE Close Ranks on Lagos Garage
By Dipo Olowookere
Leading multinational, General Electric (GE) and leading entrepreneurship organisation, The Tony Elumelu Foundation (TEF) have announced a partnership that would allow up to 25 Tony Elumelu EF Entrepreneurs to participate in a dedicated 4-week advanced manufacturing training program every year at GE’s Lagos Garage, a hub for advanced manufacturing-based innovation, strategy development, idea generation and collaboration.
The partnership results from the mutual interest of both organizations to foster economic growth and empowerment in Nigeria by building a skilled workforce and driving entrepreneurship development in the country.
Expressing her thoughts on the collaboration, GE Director of Communications & Public Affairs Patricia Obozuwa said: “We are happy to collaborate with a reputable organization such as the Tony Elumelu Foundation on this skill building initiative. There is a lot of alignment between TEF and GE’s commitment to the development of Nigerian entrepreneurs and we look forward to seeing some great success stories from TEF participants on the training program”, she added.
Speaking on TEF’s commitment to empower Nigeria’s entrepreneurs, “We welcome the collaboration with GE, world’s top 10 most innovative companies, to spur the growth of the Tony Elumelu Entrepreneurs, Nigeria’s new innovators. This program will help them to further develop their products and business models as a follow up to the Foundations’s Entrepreneurship Programme”, said Parminder Vir OBE, CEO Tony Elumelu Foundation.
The training program will, among other things, expose participants to a wide spectrum of topics that are essential for manufacturing and design in the 21st Century; sharpen teamwork, communication, and creativity skills of participants; promote excellence in the practice of design and manufacturing within and across professions; expose selected entrepreneurs to real-world design and manufacturing problems, bring concepts to reality and cultivate the entrepreneurs’ ability to express, evoke and shape experience through design and manufacturing.
GE created the Garages program in March 2012 to reinvigorate interest in invention, innovation, and manufacturing in America.
This program went global with two workshops in Lagos in 2014 and in December 2016, GE launched a permanent space, co-located with their Lagos offices dedicated to the training of young Nigerians in advanced manufacturing and business development.
By playing a role in the development of the advanced manufacturing ecosystem in Nigeria, GE hopes to create jobs, build local knowledge and capability, and encourage technology-based innovation in the manufacturing sector.
The entrepreneurs in this class will exclusively come from the TEF Entrepreneurship Programme, its 10-year, $100 million commitment to identify, train, mentor and fund 10,000 entrepreneurs, capable of changing the face of business across Africa.
By Adedapo Adesanya
The Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) is seeking a reduction in import duty exemptions, which rose to N34 trillion, limiting its ability to increase its revenue generation threshold.
The Comptroller-General of the Customs Service, Mr Adewale Adeniyi, disclosed that the value of import duty exemption certificate approvals increased to that level in 2025, describing the policy as one of the major factors restricting its revenue generation.
At an investigative session of the Senate Committee on Finance with revenue-generating agencies in Abuja on Monday, Mr Adeniyi explained that government fiscal policies have continued to impact the revenue-generating capacity of the Customs Service, both positively and negatively.
“The NCS would have generated significantly higher revenue over the years if not for government-approved import duty waivers and other external factors affecting collections,” he said.
He added that the Import Duty Exemption Certificate scheme, introduced in March 2020, accounted for about N34 trillion in approvals in 2025, with nearly 60 per cent covering duty-free importation of military hardware due to Nigeria’s prevailing security challenges.
Other government-backed duty waivers, he noted, covered the importation of Compressed Natural Gas (CNG), electric and hybrid vehicles, healthcare equipment and medical supplies, industrial machinery and manufacturing inputs, as well as food import intervention programmes.
While acknowledging the impact of the waivers on Customs revenue, Mr Adeniyi argued that fiscal policy should not be assessed solely on the basis of revenue generation but also on its broader economic and social objectives.
He, however, urged the federal government to establish stronger monitoring mechanisms to ensure beneficiaries of duty waivers deliver the intended economic outcomes, including lower consumer prices, increased local production and improved healthcare access.
The committee also expressed displeasure over the absence of several heads of government agencies invited to the hearing, including the Nigerian Civil Aviation Authority (NCAA), Small and Medium Enterprises Development Agency of Nigeria (SMEDAN), Industrial Training Fund (ITF), and the Federal Medical Centre (FMC), Jabi.
The Chairman of the Senate Committee on Finance, Mr Sani Musa, warned that the affected chief executives must appear at the committee’s next sitting or face severe sanctions under the Senate’s rules.
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By Adedapo Adesanya
The NASD Over-the-Counter (OTC) Securities Exchange rose by 0.40 per cent on Monday, July 13, buoyed by buying interest in 11 Plc, Central Securities Clearing System (CSCS) Plc and UBN Property Plc, which offset the profit-taking in Food Concepts Plc, the parent company of Chicken Republic.
11 Plc gained N20.69 to end at N227.64 per share compared with last Friday’s price of N206.95 per share, CSCS Plc grew by N1.83 to N91.48 per unit from N89.65 per unit, and UBN Property Plc added 1 Kobo to sell at N1.81 per share versus N1.80 per share.
On the flip side, Food Concepts Plc depreciated by 24 Kobo to close at N2.45 per unit, in contrast to the preceding session’s N2.69 per unit.
As a result, the market capitalisation increased by N9.2 billion to N2.587 trillion from N2.578 trillion, and the NASD Security Index (NSI) improved by 15.33 points to 4,311.67 points from 4,296.34 points.
Yesterday, the volume of securities traded by investors surged by 615.9 per cent to 9.1 million units from the previous 1.3 million units, and the value of securities rose by 997.1 per cent to N320.4 million from the preceding session’s N29.2 million, while the number of deals decreased by 12.5 per cent to 28 deals from last Friday’s 32 deals.
At the close of trades, Great Nigeria Insurance (GNI) Plc remained the most active stock by value on a year-to-date basis, with 3.4 billion units valued at N8.4 billion, followed by Infrastructure Credit Guarantee (Infracredit) Plc with 2.3 billion units worth N6.5 billion, and CSCS Plc with 73.9 million units exchanged for N5.2 billion.
GNI Plc also closed the session as the most traded stock by volume on a year-to-date basis, with 3.4 billion units sold for N8.4 billion, followed by Infracredit Plc with 2.3 billion units traded for N6.5 billion, and Resourcery Plc with 1.1 billion units transacted for N415.7 million.
