Babajide Sanwo-Olu, Lagos State governor, has said that the construction of Africa’s largest food logistics park, in Ketu-Ereyun, Epe area of the state will be a food hub that can feed more than 10 million residents.
The governor said this while flagging off construction of the park, which is aimed at boosting food security in the state in particular and Nigeria as a whole.
“The project will be implemented in two phases; the pilot phase, for which we are doing the groundbreaking; and the main phase,” Sanwo-Olu said.
“When completed, the hub will create wealth for more than 5 million people, feed more than 10 million Lagosians, guarantee food supplies for at least 90 days, and provide storage facilities for more than 1,500 trucks per day, serving the needs of thousands of operators per annum, and process large commercial transactions”. He further added.
Sanwo-Olu added that the project, Lagos State Food Security Systems and Central Logistics Hub would be built on 1.2 million square meters of land, and would have the following components: aggregation/storage facilities, administrative offices trading/brokering facilities, and packaging facilities.
The governor also said that the project would improve productivity and guarantee greater output for farmers, facilitate improved access to modern processing and packaging services for farmers; and generate useful data for the use of government agencies, private sector players, and multilateral agencies.
During the ceremony, the state governor said the hub would provide a better buying experience for consumers and help in the reduction of logistics costs while guaranteeing the standardization of quantity and quality of agricultural products
He assured the people of the state that the project will be one of the most important agricultural interventions that Nigeria has ever seen, which is “bound to have a significant national, regional, and continental impact.”