The Director General of Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA), Dr Dayo Mobereola has disclosed that the Cabotage Vessels Financing Fund (CVFF) is still intact with the federal government and has not been touched.
Dr. Mobereola hinted that the fund is for the use of ship owners, and it’s not a revenue but a contribution towards the development of the Nigerian shipping industry and ship owners.
The NIMASA DG stated this on Monday at an interactive session with the maritime media held at the Eko Hotel, Victoria Island in Lagos.
He added that the agency is fine-tuning a new process and guidelines through which the fund would be disbursed for efficient use.
He explained that the agency is exploring other avenues to ensure that the CVFF is enlarged in a way that can be leverage on to benefit the country and it requires adequate planning that takes about seventy percent of the time to achieve efficiency.
He disclosed that when disbursements begin, it will be sustained to achieve economic development through employment and business growth for investors in the blue economy.
The DG described the agency’s expansion of the blue economy concept with various state governments as an ongoing activity as the country under President Bola Tinubu is committed to economic diversification through the maritime industry.
In his words “Nigeria can achieve its desire to reduce its over dependence and can make more from blue economy like Namibia which has 33% of it’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) from the sector.
“We are going to put the modular floating dock to a very good use that once it is deployed, it will be beneficial to the economy, seafarers and to NIMASA itself.
“We know what floating dock is and we have to place it where it is appropriate. We have gone round even to Continental Ship Yard but it is not going to be where it is now forever.
“We are going to automate and one thing we will take away is ship automation. That must happen and it will happen”, Dr. Mobereola quipped.
