Dangote Cement Plc has restated its commitment to addressing the nation’s housing gap through innovative strategies to drive real estate development in Nigeria.
Group Head Sales and Marketing, Dangote Cement, Rabiu Umar made this known during a special session themed: ‘Dangote Cement – Championing Innovations for Real Estate Development in Nigeria, at the 16th Africa International Housing Show (AIHS) in Abuja.
According to him, over 40 percent of Nigeria’s population living in urban areas is projected to grow at 4.2 percent due to high fertility rate, hence the emergence of new housing estates and increase in the size of the existing ones.
He added that the disparity in the growth and metrics between rural and urban settlements has resulted in a housing shortage crisis in spite of several government’s interventions.
He said: “We have several platforms whose focus is to attend to the challenges and peculiar needs of the real estate development industry in the country. Given the high cost of developing new estates and in providing affordable houses, Dangote group has come up with some recommendations, some of which are in place and some of which are new. If we look at the tax credit scheme of the Federal government which was initiated in 2019 by the president through the signing of the executive order number seven on the Road Infrastructure Development and Refurbishment Investment Tax Credit Scheme to develop and deliver Public Private Partnerships with notable investors so as to close the road infrastructure gap in the transportation sector.
“This has assisted in the construction of many roads. Tax credit can enable us to increase the speed at which we are closing the housing gap.
“The other model which to an extent has been in existence is the adoption of the public private partnership on mass housing. Government can support the development of real estate by providing the land while private sector operators including mortgage institutions provide the funding. and many others.
Reacting to the purported speculation of incessant increase in the price of its product as against what obtains in Ghana, National Sales Director, Dangote Cement Plc, Funmi Sanni revealed that Dangote Cement is not cheaper in Ghana than in Nigeria.
While saying that the company operates in different economic climates, she noted that Dangote Cement has a cheaper price margin compared to other competitors.
“The cost of infrastructure in Nigeria directly affects the transportation of goods. We have greatly cut down on our carbon emissions by introducing less harmful materials during production. Cement is not going up at the rate other building materials are going up. However, to produce cement, a lot of energy is consumed”, she said.
