The high price of cement and sugar in the country has been attributed to the higher demand over supply of the product. One of the major cement production firms, BUA Cement Plc has explained that the price of cement is high in Nigeria today simply because Nigeria doesn’t have enough supply.
According to BUA: “In Nigeria, every day people come up to say we are self-sufficient in cement and that Nigeria can now start exporting cement; it not true. Look at the numbers: Nigeria is over 200 million people today in terms of its population. If you look at the production of cement, last year, we were under 30 million tonnes. In fact, last year was higher than the year before.
Which means that in 2019, we were doing between 26 million and 27 million. I am talking about production, and not installed capacity, which is another thing entirely. I am talking about actual cement production.” The firm stated that Nigeria is 200 million people and that makes it about 130 kilogrammes per head. “If you check, you will see that most countries in Africa are doing between 170kg to 200 kilogrammes per head. So, Nigeria is actually producing less than in other country in Africa, apart from may be Niger Republic.
So, that means that we do not have enough capacity. Nigeria can actually take 200 kilogrammes per head, but we are not able to do that, hence the reason why the price of cement is high. The moment you have any problem in any of the plants in Nigeria and there is a shut-down or any challenge, immediately, you will see the impact in terms of price going up,” BUA noted.