Osinbajo Canvasses Closer Cooperation Among Developing Nations

•D-8 to increase trade volume from $121bn to $500bn by 2030

Deji Elumoye in Abuja

Vice President Yemi Osinbajo, yesterday, said the current trend in the global economy, climate change and the Ukrainian conflict – all presented opportunities for closer ties among developing economies especially, in refocusing attention on trade and energy access for the benefit of the people.

Osinbajo stated this at the State House, Abuja, while playing host to the Nigerian-born Secretary General of the D-8 Organization, Ambassador Isiaka A. Imam.

Nigeria is a member of the D-8, an organisation for development cooperation among eight developing countries comprising Bangladesh, Egypt, Indonesia, Iran, Malaysia, Pakistan and Turkey.

Speaking on the need for closer ties among developing countries such as those in the D-8, Osinbajo stressed that this was an important time for member-countries to focus on the critical issues – trade and energy.

“But trade in particular, there is a need for greater trade engagements,” he said, noting that Nigeria offered great prospect for expanding trade among the D-8 members, and that, what the nation really needed to do was to look at how to use Nigeria as a point where you’d take off from to the AfCTA and some kind of entry way into the AfCTA.

“We think that Nigeria will be able to coordinate the trade routes and opportunities within the AfCTA. For instance, we are very prominent already in banking services all over Africa. I think that is one of the many important areas that we must look at,” he said, stressing that, one of the easiest ways of expanding trade routes was really from the services perspective, especially, financial services.

According to him, “I see that the D-8 is trying to build a payment system. I think that this is one area that we can, very quickly, move things along. This is one of the areas you may be looking at, especially engaging Nigerian banks to see in which ways they can function within the AfCTA and all our partners and member countries of the D-8.”

On Nigeria’s advocacy for a just transition to net zero, the VP urged the D-8 to join in the campaign, noting that, “We are at a point, where we are arguing about the role of gas in this whole transition to net zero. Whether we can, as it is being proposed by the wealthier countries, dispense with gas and use more of renewables. But we, of course, are pushing back and saying, we must continue to use gas.

“Our advocacy in the area of energy access is an important consideration in the whole campaign towards net zero. It is possible for the D-8 to take it up, because all our countries are faced with more or less the same sort of challenges. Our advocacy for consideration of more investments in fossil fuels especially gas (for us) is one that we think can also be taken up by the D-8.”

Commending the work done by the organisation in the area of social protection and health, especially, with the response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the vice-president said, “I thought that was an excellent opportunity to bring countries together to look at the common problems,” adding, “We shouldn’t lose the platform that was created especially, in addressing public health challenges like getting vaccines. Even local manufacture of drugs, we have to develop that capacity.

“As we saw with the COVID pandemic, we can actually work together; it is an excellent opportunity to develop the collaboration even further,”

Osinbajo said, even as he commended the renewed vigor by the present secretariat of the D-8 to give it a new direction and create better opportunities that will benefit member countries.

Earlier, Ambassador Imam, said there was a deliberate effort to reinvigorate trade among member countries in the new direction of the D-8, especially, improving trade volumes from $121 billion to a new target of about $500 billion by 2030.

He added that plans were underway to establish a D-8 MSME Centre in Abuja as part of efforts to boost trade by building capacity among MSMEs in member countries, noting that,the Centre, if realised, would be a game-changer for members to enhance the capacity and training of MSMEs in branding and quality control.