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President Buhari commissions Dangote’s $2.5bn Fertiliser plant

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President Buhari commissions Dangote’s $2.5bn Fertiliser plant

President Buhari commissions Dangote’s $2.5bn Fertiliser plant

… Says nation set to witness agric boom

 

President Buhari impressed with Dangote’s $2.5bn Fertiliser plant

…surprised at scale of investment; says nation set to witness agric boom

President Muhammadu Buhari yesterday commissioned the new 3 million Metric Tonnes capacity per annum state-of-the-art Dangote Fertiliser Urea Plant, with an emphatic assurance that the project would give a huge fillip to Nigeria’s agricultural sector, which revitalisation has been a focal point of his administration’s economic policy.

The new plant, which he commissioned in the presence of some 18 governors, ministers, captains of industries as well as prominent traditional rulers, is located at Ibeju Lekki, Lagos Free Trade Zone within the periphery of the Dangote refinery.

A visibly excited President Buhari said the coming on stream of the plant would create huge opportunities in the areas of employment, trade, warehousing, transport and logistics. The Plant, according to the President “will greatly create wealth, drastically reduce poverty and secure the future of our nation”.

He said, “In the agricultural sector, another focal point of our economic policy, we expect a boom as fertiliser is now readily available. Many Nigerians who hitherto practiced subsistence farming because of non-availability of necessary inputs can now take up agriculture as a business. We expect a rise of new breed of agropreneurs who will add value to farming and make the nation self-sufficient in food production.”

According to him, the federal government is now determined more than ever before to provide enabling environment for private sector investors to thrive, adding that his government would continue to improve on infrastructure, power, security and enact relevant laws and regulations that would drive investments in the economy.

President Buhari reiterated that part of the government’s effort in this regard was the partnership with the private sector government via a tax credit scheme, in the rehabilitation of roads across Nigeria under the Presidential Order No. 7.

“As we all know, good roads contribute to easy movement of goods and services across the nation, thus reducing cost of doing business and improving productivity. We are also rehabilitating our railway lines and building new ones to lessen the burden on our roads and create more effective multi-model transportation networks,” he added.

In an earlier welcome address, President of Dangote Group, Aliko Dangote described the new plant as a game changer, as it has the capacity to make Nigeria become self-sufficient in fertiliser production, with spare capacity to export to other markets in Africa and the rest of the world. He added that already, Dangote fertiliser has reached the markets in the USA, Brazil and Mexico.

According to him, the Fertiliser plant, which is the largest granulated  Urea fertiliser complex in Africa, occupies 500 hectares of land, was built at a cost of $2.5 Billion, and is expected to reduce drastically level of unemployment and youth restiveness in the country through employment opportunities. To him, the plant is expected to generate new jobs with top quality fertiliser being available and in sufficient quantities for the farmers.

He stated that agriculture accounts for 20 per cent of the nation’s GDP and that the new plant was an ambitious project that would provide both direct and indirect employment, thereby reducing youth restiveness

Dangote Fertiliser, according to him, would ensure emergence of farmers in the country, providing hundreds of jobs and ushering in a new era of agricultural entrepreneurs, (agroprenuers). “This breed of agroprenuers will take to farming on large scales, providing food and raw materials for our industries,” he added.

Dangote stated that the fertiliser plant is rolling out with innovations that would transform the agricultural sector in the form of extension services for small and medium scale farmers. It has set up a well-equipped fertiliser soil testing laboratory to enable it analyse and identify soil deficiency and the appropriate fertiliser blend.

“Studies have shown that applying the right fertiliser to the soil will boost productivity. This service is to cover all the geopolitical zones, and will surely change agricultural landscape in the country by transforming farming into a lucrative profession.

“Dangote Fertiliser is working with Farmer Associations, Corporate Farmers, NPK Blenders, NGO/development partners and State Governments all over Nigeria, and governments across Africa and beyond who are looking for sustainable approach to improving soil quality and farm yields,” he explained.

Speaking at the occasion, Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria, Godwin Emefiele said Nigeria is indeed indebted to Aliko Dangote for his giant stride to add value to Nigeria’s economy. According to him, “It is great that a Nigerian has taken not just this great initiative of helping to solve our perennial problem of importing petrochemical products including fertiliser but has taken advantage of the emerging huge market opportunity presented by recent global developments.”

Emefiele commended President Buhari for providing all the support needed to put in place economic policies that would reverse the trend of the doldrums, pointing out that the completion of the fertiliser plant is a stellar example of the realisation of the vision.

The CBN governor described the fertiliser plant as timely considering the recent developments in the global market, where prices of wheat, fertiliser and crude oil spiked by over 20 per cent, following the start of the Russia – Ukraine war.

“In addition to the lessons we learnt from the protectionist actions of countries during the early days of COVID-19, this investment is again a glaring testament to the foresight and tireless efforts of Mr. President in encouraging domestic production of items that can be produced in Nigeria, especially agriculture. This would not only help to enable greater productivity of our agricultural sector but also help in insulating Nigeria farmers from depending on imported fertiliser,” Emefiele stated.

He recalled that prior to 2015 when President Buhari resumed office, Nigeria had a fertiliser shortfall of about 3.5 million tonnes per annum compared to the over 6 million tonnes per annum required in the country.

“Then President Buhari inaugurated the Presidential Fertiliser Initiative and charged them with resolving this problem. With sustained efforts, other indigenous companies like Indorama and Notore with a combined capacity of over 2.5 million tonnes per annum have tried to match the market demand, yet the country still faced a huge shortfall of fertiliser supply. Today, Nigeria is self-sufficient in the production of urea, and we are also the leading producer of urea in the African continent,” he added.

The Minister of Agriculture, Dr. Mahmood Abubakar called on other investors to rise up to the occasion, noting that the Dangote Fertiliser would help to solve the problem of fertiliser shortages in Nigeria. He also assured that the government would enforce standard in the industry to maintain quality.

Lagos state governor, Mr. Babajide Sanwo-Olu commended Alhaji Aliko Dangote for always blazing the trail, noting that Lagos state government was happy to be hosting many of his businesses. He added that, “with the largest fertiliser plant in Africa in Lagos and the largest refinery in the world coming soon, there is nobody that would not be proud of Alhaji Dangote.”

The governor stated that Nigeria would quickly forget its many economic problems if another entrepreneur like Dangote could be replicated in other regions of Nigeria.

Sanwo-Olu also said that private investors could always count on Lagos State government when it comes to provision of an enabling environment to make businesses thrive.

President Buhari commissions Dangote’s $2.5bn Fertiliser plant

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BUA Foods Records 91% Surge in Profit After Tax, Hits ₦508bn in 2025

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BUA FOODS PLC RECORDS 101% PROFIT GROWTH IN H1 2025, CONSOLIDATES LEADERSHIP IN NIGERIA’S FOOD SECTOR …Revenue Rises to ₦912.5 Billion; PBT Hits ₦276.1 Billion

BUA Foods Records 91% Surge in Profit After Tax, Hits ₦508bn in 2025

By femi Oyewale

BUA Foods Plc has delivered one of the most impressive financial performances in Nigeria’s fast-moving consumer goods (FMCG) sector, recording a 91 per cent increase in Profit After Tax (PAT) for the 2025 financial year.
According to the company’s unaudited financial results for the year ended December 31, 2025, Profit After Tax rose sharply to ₦508 billion, compared with ₦266 billion recorded in 2024, underscoring strong operational efficiency, improved cost management, and resilience despite a challenging macroeconomic environment.
The near-doubling of profit reflects BUA Foods’ ability to navigate rising input costs, foreign exchange volatility, and inflationary pressures that weighed heavily on manufacturers throughout the year. Analysts note that the performance places the company among the strongest earnings growers on the Nigerian Exchange in 2025.
The company’s Q4 2025 performance further highlights this momentum. Group turnover stood at ₦383.4 billion, while gross profit came in at ₦151.5 billion, demonstrating sustained demand across its core product lines including sugar, flour, pasta, and rice.
Despite a year marked by higher operating costs across the industry, BUA Foods maintained disciplined spending. Administrative and selling expenses were kept under control relative to revenue, helping to protect margins.
Operating profit for Q4 2025 stood at ₦126.9 billion, reinforcing the company’s strong core earnings capacity. Although finance costs and foreign exchange losses remained a factor, reflecting the broader economic realities, BUA Foods still closed the period with a Net Profit Before Tax of ₦102.3 billion for the quarter.
Earnings Per Share Rise Sharply
Shareholders were among the biggest beneficiaries of the strong performance. Earnings Per Share (EPS) rose significantly, reflecting the substantial growth in net income and strengthening the company’s investment appeal.
Market watchers say the improved earnings profile could support sustained investor confidence, especially as the company continues to consolidate its leadership position in Nigeria’s food manufacturing space.
BUA Foods Records 91% Surge in Profit After Tax, Hits ₦508bn in 2025

By femi Oyewale
Industry Leadership Amid Economic Headwinds
BUA Foods’ 2025 results stand out against a backdrop of currency depreciation, energy cost spikes, and logistics challenges that constrained many manufacturers. The company’s scale, backward integration strategy, and local sourcing advantages are widely seen as key contributors to its resilience.
Outlook
With a 91% year-on-year growth in PAT, BUA Foods enters 2026 on a strong footing. Analysts expect the company to remain a major driver of growth in the consumer goods sector, provided macroeconomic stability improves and cost pressures ease.
For now, the 2025 numbers send a clear signal: BUA Foods is not only growing—it is accelerating.
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Adron Homes Unveils “Love for Love” Valentine Promo with Exciting Discounts, Luxury Gifts, and Travel Rewards

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Adron Homes Unveils “Love for Love” Valentine Promo with Exciting Discounts, Luxury Gifts, and Travel Rewards

Adron Homes Unveils “Love for Love” Valentine Promo with Exciting Discounts, Luxury Gifts, and Travel Rewards

In celebration of the season of love, Adron Homes and Properties has announced the launch of its special Valentine campaign, “Love for Love” Promo, a customer-centric initiative designed to reward Nigerians who choose to express love through smart, lasting real estate investments.

The Love for Love Promo offers clients attractive discounts, flexible payment options, and an array of exclusive gift items, reinforcing Adron Homes’ commitment to making property ownership both rewarding and accessible. The campaign runs throughout the Valentine season and applies to the company’s wide portfolio of estates and housing projects strategically located across Nigeria.

 

Adron Homes Unveils “Love for Love” Valentine Promo with Exciting Discounts, Luxury Gifts, and Travel Rewards

Speaking on the promo, the company’s Managing Director, Mrs Adenike Ajobo, stated that the initiative is aimed at encouraging individuals and families to move beyond conventional Valentine gifts by investing in assets that secure their future. According to the company, love is best demonstrated through stability, legacy, and long-term value—principles that real estate ownership represents.

Under the promo structure, clients who make a payment of ₦100,000 receive cake, chocolates, and a bottle of wine, while those who pay ₦200,000 are rewarded with a Love Hamper. Payments of ₦500,000 attract a Love Hamper plus cake, and clients who pay ₦1,000,000 enjoy a choice of a Samsung phone or a Love Hamper with cake.

The rewards become increasingly premium as commitment grows. Clients who pay ₦5,000,000 receive either an iPad or an all-expenses-paid romantic getaway for a couple at one of Nigeria’s finest hotels, which includes two nights’ accommodation, special treats, and a Love Hamper. A payment of ₦10,000,000 comes with a choice of a Samsung Z Fold 7, three nights at a top-tier resort in Nigeria, or a full solar power installation.

For high-value investors, the Love for Love Promo delivers exceptional lifestyle experiences. Clients who pay ₦30,000,000 on land are rewarded with a three-night couple’s trip to Doha, Qatar, or South Africa, while purchasers of any Adron Homes house valued at ₦50,000,000 receive a double-door refrigerator.

The promo covers Adron Homes’ estates located in Lagos, Shimawa, Sagamu, Atan–Ota, Papalanto, Abeokuta, Ibadan, Osun, Ekiti, Abuja, Nasarawa, and Niger States, offering clients the opportunity to invest in fast-growing, strategically positioned communities nationwide.

Adron Homes reiterated that beyond the incentives, the campaign underscores the company’s strong reputation for secure land titles, affordable pricing, strategic locations, and a proven legacy in real estate development.

As Valentine’s Day approaches, Adron Homes encourages Nigerians at home and in the diaspora to take advantage of the Love for Love Promo to enjoy exceptional value, exclusive rewards, and the opportunity to build a future rooted in love, security, and prosperity.

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Why Nigeria’s Banks Still on Shaky Ground with Big Profits, Weak Capital

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*Why Nigeria’s Banks Still on Shaky Ground with Big Profits, Weak Capital*

*BY BLAISE UDUNZE*

Despite the fragile 2024 economy grappling with inflation, currency volatility, and weak growth, Nigeria’s banking industry was widely portrayed as successful and strong amid triumphal headlines. The figures appeared to signal strength, resilience, and superior management as the Tier-1 banks such as Access Bank, Zenith Bank, GTBank, UBA, and First Bank of Nigeria, collectively reported profits approaching, and in some cases exceeding, N1 trillion. Surprisingly, a year later, these same banks touted as sound and solid are locked in a frenetic race to the capital markets, issuing rights offers and public placements back-to-back to meet the Central Bank of Nigeria’s N500 billion recapitalisation thresholds.

 

The contradiction is glaring. If Nigeria’s biggest banks are so profitable, why are they unable to internally fund their new capital requirements? Why have no fewer than 27 banks tapped the capital market in quick succession despite repeated assurances of balance-sheet robustness? And more fundamentally, what do these record profits actually say about the real health of the banking system?

 

The recapitalisation directive announced by the CBN in 2024 was ambitious by design. Banks with international licences were required to raise minimum capital to N500 billion by March 2026, while national and regional banks faced lower but still substantial thresholds ranging from N200 billion to N50 billion, respectively. Looking at the policy, it was sold as a modern reform meant to make banks stronger, more resilient in tough times, and better able to support major long-term economic development. In theory, strong banks should welcome such reforms. In practice, the scramble that followed has exposed uncomfortable truths about the structure of bank profitability in Nigeria.

 

At the heart of the inconsistency is a fundamental misunderstanding often encouraged by the banks themselves between profits and capital. Unknown to many, profitability, no matter how impressive, does not automatically translate into regulatory capital. Primarily, the CBN’s recapitalisation framework actually focuses on money paid in by shareholders when buying shares, fresh equity injected by investors over retained earnings or profits that exist mainly on paper.

 

This distinction matters because much of the profit surge recorded in 2024 and early 2025 was neither cash-generative nor sustainably repeatable. A significant portion of those headline banks’ profits reported actually came from foreign exchange revaluation gains following the sharp fall of the naira after exchange-rate unification. The industry witnessed that banks’ holding dollar-denominated assets their books showed bigger numbers as their balance sheets swell in naira terms, creating enormous paper profits without a corresponding improvement in underlying operational strength. These gains inflated income statements but did little to strengthen core capital, especially after the CBN barred banks from using FX revaluation gains for dividends or routine operations. In effect, banks looked richer without becoming stronger.

 

Beyond FX effects, Nigerian banks have increasingly relied on non-interest income fees, charges, and transaction levies to drive profitability. While this model is lucrative, it does not necessarily deepen financial intermediation or expand productive lending. High profits built on customer charges rather than loan growth offer limited support for long-term balance-sheet expansion. They also leave banks vulnerable when macroeconomic conditions shift, as is now happening.

Indeed, the recapitalisation exercise coincides with a turning point in the monetary cycle. The extraordinary conditions that supported bank earnings in 2024 and 2025 are beginning to unwind. Analysts now warn that Nigerian banks are approaching earnings reset, as net interest margins the backbone of traditional banking profitability, come under sustained pressure.

Renaissance Capital, in a January note, projects that major banks including Zenith, GTCO, Access Holdings, and UBA will struggle to deliver earnings growth in 2026 comparable to recent performance.

 

In a real sense, the CBN is expected to lower interest rates by 400 to 500 basis points because inflation is slowing down, and this means that banks will earn less on loans and government bonds, but they may not be able to quickly lower the interest they pay on deposits or other debts. The cash reserve requirements are still elevated, which does not earn interest; banks can’t easily increase or expand lending investments to make up for lower returns. The implications are significant. Net interest margin, the difference between what banks earn on loans and investments and what they pay on deposits, is poised to contract. Deposit competition is intensifying as lenders fight to shore up liquidity ahead of recapitalisation deadlines, pushing up funding costs. At the same time, yields on treasury bills and bonds, long a safe and lucrative haven for banks are expected to soften in a lower-rate environment. The result is a narrowing profit cushion just as banks are being asked to carry far larger equity bases.

 

Compounding this challenge is the fading of FX revaluation windfalls. With the naira relatively more stable in early 2026, the non-cash gains that once flattered bank earnings have largely evaporated. What remains is the less glamorous reality of core banking operations: credit risk management, cost efficiency, and genuine loan growth in a sluggish economy. In this new environment, maintaining headline profits will be far harder, even before accounting for the dilutive impact of recapitalisation.

 

That dilution is another underappreciated consequence of the capital rush. Massive share issuances mean that even if banks manage to sustain absolute profit levels, earnings per share and return on equity are likely to decline. Zenith, Access, UBA, and others are dramatically increasing their share counts. The same earnings pie is now being divided among many more shareholders, making individual returns leaner than during the pre-recapitalisation boom. For investors, the optics of strong profits may soon give way to the reality of weaker per-share performance.

Yet banks have pressed ahead, not only out of regulatory necessity but also strategic calculation.

 

During this period of recapitalization, investors are interested in the stock market with optimism, especially about bank shares, as banks are raising fresh capital, and this makes it easier to attract investments. This has become a season for the management teams to seize the moment to raise funds at relatively attractive valuations, strengthen ownership positions, and position themselves for post-recapitalisation dominance. In several cases, major shareholders and insiders have increased their stakes, as projected in the media, signalling confidence in long-term prospects even as near-term returns face pressure.

 

There is also a broader structural ambition at play. Well-capitalised banks can take on larger single obligor exposures, finance infrastructure projects, expand regionally, and compete more credibly with pan-African and global peers. From this perspective, recapitalisation is not merely about compliance but about reshaping the competitive hierarchy of Nigerian banking. What will be witnessed in the industry is that those who succeed will emerge larger, fewer, and more powerful. Those that fail will be forced into consolidation, retreat, or irrelevance.

 

For the wider economy, the outcome is ambiguous. Stronger banks with deeper capital buffers could improve systemic stability and enhance Nigeria’s ability to fund long-term development. The point is that while merging or consolidating banks may make them safer, it can also harm the market and the economy because it will reduce competition, let a few banks dominate, and encourage them to earn easy money from bonds and fees instead of funding real businesses. The truth be told, injecting more capital into the banks without complementary reforms in credit infrastructure, risk-sharing mechanisms, and fiscal discipline, isn’t enough as the aforementioned reforms are also needed.

 

The rush as exposed in this period, is that the moment Nigerian banks started raising new capital, the glaring reality behind their reported profits became clearer, that profits weren’t purely from good management, while the financial industry is not as sound and strong as its headline figures. The fact that trillion-naira profit banks must return repeatedly to shareholders for fresh capital is not a sign of excess strength, but of structural imbalance.

 

With the deadline for banks to raise new capital coming soon, by 31 March 2026, the focus has shifted from just raising N500 billion. N200 billion or N50 billion to think about the future shape and quality of Nigeria’s financial industry, or what it will actually look like afterward. Will recapitalisation mark a turning point toward deeper intermediation, lower dependence on speculative gains, and stronger support for economic growth? Or will it simply reset the numbers while leaving underlying incentives unchanged?

The answer will define the next chapter of Nigerian banking long after the capital market roadshows have ended and the profit headlines have faded.

 

 

Blaise, a journalist and PR professional, writes from Lagos and can be reached via: [email protected]

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