The Rector, Certified Institute of Shipping, Prof. Alex Okwuashi has underscored the need for the establishment of maritime bank in Nigeria to give the required support for the infrastructural development in the maritime sector.
Prof. Okwuashi who made this known while delivering the 2014 investiture lecture titled,” Development of Transport Infrastructure in Nigeria”, organized at the Certified Institute of Shipping, Magbon, Lagos on Thursday noted that the bank should be created and funded by the government so as to live up to expectations.
While acknowledging that a new Maritime Microfinance Bank was in the offing, he however said that the proposed Maritime Microfinance Bank cannot meet up with the capital expectation of the Maritime industry.
According to him,” the microfinance bank cannot give more than fifty to hundred million Naira, but we are talking of cost of a ship, a ship for example worth ninety million dollars, one hundred and twenty million dollars which the microfinance cannot provide”.
“We need banks that are risk averse to stop and begin to think about benefits in the maritime industry and invest in them. So, they can be a consortium of banks to finance projects and NIMASA can also help with ship financing and allow shipping companies to form consortium managers and if they finance the purchase of ship, ship managers depending on their professional areas can manage the ships in that sector”.
He further posited that a joint financial and monetary motivation plan could be put in place as well as a planned approach to empower indigenous interests in the shipping sector.
“The Cabotage administration ought to be dependably actualized to make for more contribution of neighbourhood administrators inside the flag state. Maritime strategy creators ought to understudy created economies with a perspective to copying a few gimmicks and toe their own particular way of development”, he said.
