Browsing: Lagos

• The 1,028km highway will connect economic capitals of five West African countries, part of Ecowas economic block.
• Estimates show the project will cost $15.1 billion and is part of the Trans-African Highway Network.
• ECOWAS Heads of State want to speed up the construction of the highway..

The African Development Bank and the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Heads of State now want to speed up the construction of the highway between Abidjan and Lagos.

This was realized after the 1st round table of development partners and major regional and international DFIs on the financing of the Construction of the Abidjan–Lagos Corridor Highway, in Abidjan, Côte d’Ivoire.

The round table aimed at providing the main regional and international development finance institutions with the latest information on this major regional project.

Abidjan-Lagos road design

The meeting also served as an awareness-raising platform and “soft market test” for the project, …

• German-based biotech company BioNTech is set to acquire InstaDeep, founded by a Tunisian-born and U.K.-based artificial intelligence (AI) startup, for up to £562 million (US$680 million) in its largest deal yet.
• The Tunis and London-based enterprise AI startup uses advanced machine learning techniques to bring AI to applications within an enterprise environment.
• The startup has offices in Paris, Tunis, Lagos, Dubai and Cape Town.

German pharmaceutical giant BioNTech announced it is acquiring Tunisian artificial intelligence start-up InstaDeep, in what is being hailed as a massive win for Africa’s tech ecosystem. The agreement is reportedly worth an estimated £582 million (US $682 million)

The two companies collaborated in 2020 to rapidly set up an intelligent system to detect Covid-19 variants, and this deal would accelerate BioNTech’s goal of harnessing the power of machine learning to improve the drug discovery process.

This acquisition is as a result of this long-term partnership that …

In Nigeria, where an estimated 38 million people, or 36% of adults, remain financially excluded, the government has set a target of 95% financial inclusion by 2024. 

While this may seem like an ambitious goal, that will require institutions to re-strategize initiatives and policies to accelerate the delivery of financial inclusion services, a lot of tech-backed firms are being developed in the West African country to help achieve this goal. 

Among them is Lagos-based FinTech unicorn Interswitch which seems to have heeded that call, leveraging its position as a market leader in digital payment services to bridge the massive financial inclusion gap and help bring as many people into the financial and economic fold as possible.…

In his remarks, the company’s regional head – south, Olalekan Babalola, emphasised that NITRA is integral to bringing the industry together to channel innovative and collaborative ways in which the federal government, regulators, providers, and stakeholders can partner on ICT growth as well as address policy impediments to its acceleration and infrastructure demands. 

According to the latest research, this has become crucial. A recent data survey indicated that 58% of Nigerians are still unconnectedly causing a loss of unquantifiable revenue that can be derived from the ICT sector alone and utilized as an enabler to all sectors of the economy. Therefore, platforms such as NITRA should remain steadfast in advocating industry cooperation towards optimizing connectivity capabilities with scalable solutions. 

In a statement, Phase 3 Telecom’s spokesperson, Morayo Nwabufo, said: “Phase3 is committed and will continue to support credible initiatives that foster meaningful connectivity and innovative technological advancements for a fully …

According to the IMF World Economic Outlook report published in July 2021, the global economy is projected to grow 6.0 per cent in 2021 and 4.9 per cent in 2022 and this global forecast is unchanged from April 2021 projections.

These statistics show a positive recovery of the global economy and no signal of economic collapse so far, despite the third consecutive fall in the average rating of financial centres as shown by the Global Financial Centres Index 30 report.…

The construction of the Lagos-Abidjan Highway has the capacity to unlock 85 per cent of trade within the ECOWAS sub-region according to the African Development Bank (AfDB).

The Highway which is 1,028-km project will span across different countries which includes Cote d’Ivoire, Ghana, Togo, Benin and Nigeria -and traverse the economic capitals of the five coastal countries, starting from Abidjan and ending in Lagos, while equally straddling eight border crossings.

Lamin Barrow the Director-General of AfDB who represented Akinwumi Adesina the AfDB President appearing on Tuesday as a panelist at a one-day webinar to showcase the investment opportunities from the Federal Government of Nigeria’s reforms and privatization activities, said that while the Federal Government had spearheaded various reforms in the banking sector that enhanced the resilience of the financial system, there was a need to stay the course in completing the bold reforms initiated to restructure the energy sector.

Nigeria’s …

The state government of Lagos will launch a five-year Agriculture Development Roadmap in line with its mission development agenda Strategy on Thursday April 22, 2021.

Explaining this to the media Ms. Abisola Olusanya the State Commissioner for Agriculture in Lagos said that the Roadmap will steer their goals and help the State achieve its goal of making Lagos a 21^st Century Economy.

The Roadmap will focus on the development of agricultural value chains where the State has competitive and comparative advantages of ensuring that the State attains its food security goals.

“I am delighted to address you today and avail you of the forthcoming launch of the five-year Agricultural Development Roadmap for the Ministry which is slated for launch by the State Governor, Mr. Babajide Olusola Sanwo-Olu next week Thursday.

This bold step which will be taken by the Governor Babajide Sanwo-olu-led Lagos State government to launch a five-year …

When Nigeria announced its first positive coronavirus infection African countries are now on guard as this has been a wake-up call for nations to strength their surveillance as well as disease containment.

The first case of the coronavirus was confirmed on February 25, via an Italian carrier who works in Nigeria and flew into the nation’s commercial city, Lagos.

According to information from BBC, Nigerian authorities commented that the “patient zero” is who is being treated in a hospital within the city, is stable and with no serious symptoms.

On the larger scale, Egypt and Algeria have also confirmed cases of the virus, while Kenya—whose authorities were debating on flights cancellation to China have given a court order to suspend flights from China, on February 28.

On a global scale, more than 2,800 people have died and more than 83,000 cases of coronavirus have been confirmed in more than 50 …

Africa recorded the highest growth in internet users globally between 2005 and 2018…