President Bola Ahmed Tinubu has urged West African leaders to end the practice of exporting raw minerals without processing them, advocating instead for regional manufacturing and value-added production.
Gatekeepers News reports that the president spoke at the inaugural West Africa Economic Summit on Saturday in Abuja.
Tinubu emphasised the need for a shift from extractive economies to development models that prioritise industrialization and integration.
He said, “West Africa is one of the last great frontiers of economic growth. Yet opportunity alone does not guarantee transformation.”
“Opportunity is not destiny. We must earn it through vision, integration, policy coherence, collaboration, and capital alignment.”
“Intra-regional trade remains under 10%—a challenge we can no longer afford to ignore. The low trade is not due to a failure of will but a coordination failure.”
“The global economy will not wait for West Africa to get its act together, and neither should we. Rather than competing in isolation or relying on external partners, we must strengthen our regional value chains, invest in infrastructure, and coordinate our policies.”
Tinubu further lamented Africa’s absence in previous industrial revolutions and called for urgent action to avoid missing out on the next one.
He said, “Let us also recognise that Africa was left behind in previous industrial revolutions. We cannot afford to miss the next one.”
“Our rare minerals power tomorrow’s green technologies-yet it is not enough to be resource-rich; we must become value-chain smart and invest in local processing and regional manufacturing.”
The president called for an end to the “pit to port” model, which involves extracting raw resources and exporting them directly without any value addition.
He said, “The era of pit to port must end. We must turn our mineral wealth into domestic economic value-jobs, technology, and manufacturing.”
“The fundamental transformation will not come solely from government but from unleashing our people’s entrepreneurial spirit.”
Tinubu stressed that the role of governments is to create an enabling environment through stable laws, order, and business-friendly policies, while the private sector should take the lead in driving growth.
He called for regional collaboration to build a West Africa that is investor-friendly, competitive, and resilient, driven by a shared vision and collective responsibility.
