While Akwa Ibom State is yet to establish its authority in the oil palm sector of Nigeria’s economy, Edo State has been able to attract $531.2 million from oil palm investment.
The Attah administration had an ambitious oil palm production ambition that was not continued by the Akpabio administration and that of the incumbent Governor Udom Emmanuel.
In a bid to further scale-up the tempo of the sector, Okomu Oil Plc has announced changes to the board of its directors following the resignation of Dr. Luc Boedt and Philippe De Traux De Wardin as Non-Executive Directors of the company.
Subsequently, the company has appointed Philippe Fabri and Mrs. Isabelle Chevalley to the board. This was disclosed through a notice filed with the Exchange and signed by the company’s secretary, Chukwuebuka Omerole.
The resignation of Dr. Luc Boedt and Philippe De Traux De Wardin as Non-Executive Directors of the Board took effect from February 2, 2022.
The appointment of Philippe Fabri and Mrs. Isabelle Chevalley to occupy the positions of Non-Executive Director and Independent Non-Executive Director, respectively, is effective from March 16th, 2022.
Philippe Febri is a graduate of Boston University, Massachusetts. He is a specialist in Business Management and Finance. He worked at Petercam in Brussels, Belgium as an Equity Analyst in 2010, Ecologis in Brussels, Belgium as a Project Manager in 2011, Bollore Group in London, the United Kingdom as a Project Manager in 2013, Socfin Group, Fribourg, Switzerland, as a Palm Oil and Rubber Trader in 2017, Financial Controller in 2020 and is currently a Chief Executive at Socfin Group, Fribourg, Switzerland.
Isabelle Chevalley has a Ph.D. in Science with a specialization in Phytochemistry and Alimentary Chemistry from the University of Lausanne in 2000. She has over 20 years of experience in the field of renewable energies in Europe and Africa.
She was the former President of the Swiss Wind Energy Association Suisse Eole and was a member organizing committee of the Swiss renewable energy fair Energissima and Greentech in Fribourg.
She founded the Swiss-Africa Parliamentary group, which is committed to the countries of West Africa within the NGO Nouvelle Planete. She also advises the speaker of the parliament of Burkina Faso and holds a diplomatic passport from that country.
In the meantime, the state’s Commissioner for Agriculture and Food Security, Stephen Idehenre, says Edo has attracted about $531.2 million from nine firms in the oil palm sector through the state oil palm programme.
dehenre made this known during the inauguration of the year 2022 farming season and the FOARE Mushroom Production Centre in Benin on Thursday.
While noting that the state oil palm programme was created to bring opportunities to large, medium and small investors in the oil palm sub-sector, he also said that 62,000 hectares of land had been allocated to investors under the programme.
“The programme is expected to create more than 200,000 jobs across the oil palm value chain and would add more than 1,000,000 metric tonnes to local production of oil palm by 2030.
“No fewer than 22,272 jobs were created from crop enterprise in 2021 while, the project activities in 2021 supported about 1,093 rice, cassava and catfish farmers.
“1,050 hectares of land was also developed for the farmers. This number will be scaled-up in the 2022 farming season,” he said.
According to him, the state is making steady progress in agriculture that will drive home the sector as the major economic pillar for job and wealth creation.
The commissioner said “we are attracting enough values to justify the decision to make the sector one of the pillars of the state Make Edo Great Again (MEGA) agenda”.
