Nigeria Sees Sustainability Helping Growth, Ex-Minister Says
Nigeria Sees Sustainability Helping Growth, Ex-Minister Says
(Bloomberg) -- Nigeria sees addressing environmental issues as contributing to economic growth and has developed a national plan to involve every industry in the country, erstwhile Finance Minister Zainab Ahmed said.
“The SEC has developed and released guidelines for green bonds, the central bank has made it mandatory for banks” to reflect their sustainability efforts in their annual reports, Ahmed said at the Bloomberg Emerging & Frontier Forum in London on Tuesday.
Africa’s biggest oil producer and most populous country, which issued its first green bonds in 2017, has a plan to issue such bonds every year to finance environmentally sustainable projects, she said.
Ahmed was appointed finance minister in September by President Muhammadu Buhari, whose first tenure ended in May. Buhari who was re-elected for a second four-year term, is yet to constitute a new cabinet.
The West African nation of more than 200 million people followed its first green bond issuance with another offer of 15 billion naira in May, which was oversubscribed, according to the Debt Management Office.
To contact the reporter on this story: Tope Alake in Lagos at talake@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Anthony Osae-Brown at aosaebrown2@bloomberg.net, Dulue Mbachu
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