The Alternative bank
Alternative bank signs MOU in Niger. Niger State Governor Mohammed Bago has signed a Memorandum of Understanding with Alternative Bank on the state’s long-term development.
According to the PUNCH, Sterling Financial Holdings started the bank in October 2023 with the goal of building wealth for all in a sustainable way by doing things differently and using a fresh approach to collaborating with its customers.
The MoU, which was signed in Abuja on Friday, focuses on education, health, agriculture, transportation, energy, and infrastructure, among other topics.
While Governor Bago signed on behalf of the state government, the bank’s Executive Director, Garba Mohammed, signed on behalf of the financial institution.
A statement issued by the Chief Press Secretary to the Governor, Bologi Ibrahim, quoted Bago as expressing delight with the financial institution for its readiness to partner the state government, noting that the development will bring out the huge agricultural potentials in the state.
In his own words, the governor said, “Niger State is yet to cultivate up to 1 per cent of her vast arable land, adding that under his watch, the state would purchase state-of-the-art equipments including caterpillars, bulldozers, and graders on a long lease to prepare land for cultivation of about 4.5 million hectares which is half of it cultivable land in the next 10 years.”
He also mentioned that the state is in talks with Almarai, a Saudi international dairy corporation, about producing Alfalfa plants, citing the plant’s economic worth. He stated that the plant’s proteinous content will be investigated in order to produce better seedlings for planting.
The governor then asked Sadiq Yusuf, the Chairman of Niger Foods Limited and his Deputy Chief of Staff, to work with the financial institution to accomplish the desired outcome of the agreement.
Garba Mohammed, the CEO of Alternative Bank, previously stated that the financial organization had produced multi-million dollar investments in agriculture in the state.
According to him, an international partner has expressed willingness to invest $65 million in a sugarcane plantation on five hectares of land in the state, with an estimated annual output of 50,000 tonnes, 4,767 job opportunities, methanol production, 40,000 tonnes of animal feeds, and 11 megawatts of electricity generation.
This is just as he noted that another development partner from the United Arab Emirates is ready to invest between 1 to 10 million US dollars for the exportation of the Alfalfa plant, saying about100,000 hectares of land would be required for the cultivation of the plant