A development economist, Dr Chidi Onuoha, says the solution for Nigeria to come out of the current economic recession is investment in renewable energy.
Onuoha, National President, Sustainable Energy Practitioners Association of Nigeria (SEPAN), made this known in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja on Saturday.
He said that policymakers had not discovered the secret in renewable energy and how it could help to restore the economy.
The development economist said that the association would educate the policymakers on how to utilise the country’s renewable energy potential.
“What we are doing now is to educate them that money should be appropriated toward renewable energy and that renewable energy are not cumbersome.
“The technology is not expensive; the price is coming down now; so, it is good for us to invest in it to boost the economy,” he said.
He spoke on the recent International Monetary Fund (IMF) report which stated that South Africa had overtaken Nigeria as the biggest economy and advised the country to invest in renewable energy.
The position IMF report reclaimed for Nigeria using the GDP at the end of 2015, the size of South Africa’s economy was 301 billion dollar at the rand’s current exchange rate, while Nigeria’s GDP was 296 billion dollar.
Onuoha said “Nigeria was the largest economy in Africa before with 510 billion dollar when you compare it to 4,000 megawatt of energy and economy that has the highest.
“That means, there is energy deficiency in the country.
“What it means is that if Nigeria economy is large, South Africa has more than 20,000 or 30,000 megawatts and they have 5,000 megawatts of renewable energy alone.
“Nigeria’s electricity came down with challenges to 2,800 megawatts,” he said.
Onuoha said one of objectives of SEPAN was to encourage the Federal Government to achieve 5,000 megawatts of renewable energy by 2020 through its advocacy work.
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