By Steve Agbota
The Minister for Marine and Blue Economy, Adegboyega Oyetola, has decied inadequate investments in inland waterways to enable the sector deliver enormous potentials.
Oyetola gave this remark while delivering a keynote address at a Maritime Business Roundtable Breakfast Meeting (MBRBM), organised by Zoe Maritime Resources recently, with the theme: “Security and New Technologies in Inland Waterways Transportation.” He said that low investments in the nation’s inland waterways remains a huge challenge in the sector.
He also decried lack of strict implementation of regulations.
Oyetola, who was represented by the Deputy Director, Cabotage and Shipping Development, Ministry of Marine and Blue Economy, Ekanem Selia, described inland waterways transport system as an essential element of integrated transport systems.
“Inland waterways is one of the oldest means of transporting goods and services from one point to another. Nevertheless, the least developed compared to air and road transportation in Nigeria.
“It is worthy to note that when the inland waterways transportation system is properly developed, it will be characterised by high transport volume, low energy consumption, and low negative environmental impact,” he said.
According to him, a thriving inland waterways system will usher in enormous benefits to the nation’s economy.
Speaking earlier, the Consul General, People’s Republic of China in Lagos, Ms. Yan Yuqing, said that digitalisation and intelligence have become top priority in China’s inland waterway and maritime transport systems.
“The Changjiang River has consistently been the world’s busiest inland waterway transportation route, known for its high volume of traffic. In 2022, China’s inland waterway transportation completed a freight volume of more than 4.4 billion tons and goods turnover of 1.9 trillion ton-kilometers, highlighting the significant support for the regional economic development and social progress,” she said.
“In the sector, quality productivity forces are innovation-led, oppose damage to the ecological environment, promoting the low-carbonization of economic and social development, and the collaborative development of high-quality economic development and high-level protection of the environment,” she said.
Noting that both China and Nigeria are nations with many important rivers, river-ports, long coastlines and seaports, she maintained that the field of waterway transportation and marine conservation provides opportunities for China and Nigeria to learn from each other and cooperate more closely.
“Currently, China has established transportation links with more than 100 countries and regions in the world, and the size of the fleet owned by China’s shipping companies has reached 249.2 million gross tons, becomes the world’s largest ship owning nation in terms of gross tonnage. Waterway freight accounts for about 17 per cent of the national freight volume, while its cargo turnover accounts for about 54% of the total turnover in the transportation system.”
“Maritime transportation handles about 95% of China’s foreign trade volume and plays a key role in maintaining the safety and stability of both international and domestic logistics supply chains,” she said.
In terms of port cargo volume, she observed that China has consistently ranked first in the world for many years in both port cargo throughput and container throughput.
“Among the top ten ports globally for cargo and container throughput, China has 8 and 7 respectively. In 2022, China’s national port cargo throughput in China reached about 15.7 billion tons, with a container throughput of nearly 300 million TEUs,” she said.
Also speaking, the Managing Director of National Inland Waterways Authority (NIWA), Alhaji Munirudeen Oyebamiji, emphasised the role of stakeholders sensitization of global best safety standards in inland waterways operations.
The NIWA boss, who was represented by Assistant General Manager, Ports and Environment, Hajiya Aisha Eri observed the Authority had robust partnership with Nigeria Police Force, Nigeria Immigration Service, among other security agencies to police the nation’s waterways.