News
Abdulhameed: Global Recognition for Passionate Agribusiness Technocrat
By Cletus Adole
“A leader is one who knows the way, goes the way, and shows the way”. —John Maxwell
The recent announcement that Mr Aliyu Abdulhameed, MD/CEO of the Nigerian Incentive-Based Risk Sharing System for Agricultural Lending (NIRSAL PLC), is a winner of the prestigious Global Award of the CEO Today Magazine for 2021 will not surprise anyone familiar with the contributions which the man and the organization he leads are have made to the transformation of Nigerian agriculture and agribusiness over the past five years.
Mr Aliyu Abdulhameed, MD/CEO, NIRSAL PLC
As a result of the dynamic and innovative leadership of NIRSAL PLC under Abdulhameed’s watch, the young institution which was barely a blip on the radar five years ago has become a robust and respected presence with solid and measurable accomplishments making real impact at various levels of the agro-economy.
According to CEO Today, Abdulhameed, a highly experienced agricultural economist with over 30 years hands-on experience in agricultural value chains and markets in sub-Sahara Africa is deserving of recognition on account of the innovations and accomplishments that NIRSAL PLC has notched up under his leadership.
The evidence of the impact he is making is unimpeachable, starting from NIRSAL PLC’s core mandate of making agriculture more attractive to banks and encouraging more investment in the sector.
Among NIRSAL’s achievements under Abdulhameed’s watch is the facilitation of over $550 million to various actors across Agricultural Value Chains for mechanization activities, input distribution, and the production, processing, trading and marketing of agricultural commodities.
Related to this, commercial banks have pledged to provide an additional $500 million to fund agriculture in the short to medium-term based on their faith in NIRSAL PLC’s Credit Risk Guarantee (CRG) and structured Agro Geo-Cooperatives®.
It is an indication that financiers are growing more and more confident in lending to agriculture. This claim is supported by the remarkable growth in the rate of bank lending to agriculture, from 1.4% pre-NIRSAL to 4.8 per cent as of Q3 2020.
The CEO Today Magazine Award has been won by a select group of outstanding achievers on different continents over the years. It recognizes “strong and innovative leadership among the most inspiring CEOs and business leaders” across the world.
The highly regarded platform honours the most-respected companies and their C-Level executives who lead the way for others on a global stage.
According to the magazine, the 2021 awards are special because the CEOs selected, delivered despite the Coronavirus pandemic.
The 2021 award winners come from the academia, tech, e-commerce, public administration and more from several countries including the UAE, Germany, USA, Sweden, Bulgaria and China. The include:
Dr Abdullatif Al Shamsi, President and CEO of the Higher Colleges of Technology, the largest higher institution in the United Arab Emirates with 23,000 students across 16 campuses;
Michael Lampel, CEO and Founder of Qooper Media, an accomplished investor and business development expert based in south west Germany;
Philip Weiser, CEO of AnyDesk, an innovative remote solutions company in Germany which has witnessed impressive growth while disrupting the remote software solutions industry since the pandemic
As those who know him can attest, Abdulhameed is the kind of leader who is comfortable at all points of the leadership spectrum.
He is both a visionary passionate both about the big issues at the critical junction of agriculture and agribusiness as well as a hands-on technocrat who likes to immerse himself in the nitty-gritty details of small scale farming.
This passion shines through whether he is on the podium at a conference, marshaling his troops in the office to reach targets or on a field trip to inspect an agricultural project supported by NIRSAL PLC.
Always bustling with energy and big ideas, he is always focused on one priority whether he is discussing the latest technologies and techniques in global agriculture or the best methods to organize the millions of poor farmers for higher productivity: better results.
The award for innovative leadership is therefore well deserved because, at NIRSAL PLC, Abdulhameed is showcasing skills and experience spanning across a wide range of areas including, agricultural value chain development, agricultural value chain finance, research and innovation, extension services, agribusiness development, product marketing, strategy, project management as well as agricultural policy analysis and advocacy.
The passionate agribusiness manager and thought leader is fond of saying that NIRSAL PLC has “innovation in its DNA”. This is clear from the raft of innovations he is leading in the organization such as the creation of NIRSAL Agro Geo-Cooperative® (AGC) scheme, an ambitious, paradigmatic plan targeted at revolutionizing agricultural production and productivity in the country.
The scheme is structuring farmers and aggregating their farmlands into contiguous stretches of 250 hectares each and link them with training, inputs, mechanization, financing and produce buyers.
AGC will build on the increasing benefits of NIRSAL initiatives that are making a real difference in creating opportunities for farmers. So far, through NIRSAL’s facilitation, more than 370,000 direct jobs have been created and an estimated 1.8 million indirect jobs in the pre-upstream, upstream, midstream and downstream segments of the agricultural value chain, specifically in the areas of mechanization, input supply, primary production and processing.
Other innovations being progressed under Abdulhameed’s watch include the creation and mapping of Agricultural Commodity Ecological Areas (ACEAs); the development of the Mapping to Markets (M2M) strategy; the development of innovative index-based agricultural insurance products; the introduction of comprehensive field monitoring by remote sensing satellite systems and granular validation by UAS platforms; and the development of the Secured Agricultural Commodity Transport & Storage Corridor (SATS-C) model to address logistical inefficiencies in the agricultural value chain in Nigeria.
This is not the first significant recognition of NIRSAL under Abdulhameed’s leadership. The institution also won the Outstanding Development Finance Institution Award of the Annual BusinessDay Banks’ And Other Financial institutions (BAFI) Awards back to back in 2018 and 2019. BAFI recognizes and celebrates outstanding performance in Nigeria’s financial services industry including those that have brought revolutionary benefits to the sector.
The CEO Today award confirms the potent blend of quality and passion that defines this remarkable man and leader.
Perhaps more important, it is a credit to the unique institution he leads and the great difference that he, along with his hardworking team are making in the executive suites of the financial sector and fields of Nigeria’s agriculture and agribusiness.
*Cletus Adole is a policy analyst based in Abuja.
Development Bank of Nigeria (DBN) has awarded a total of N13 million in grants to three standout tech startups at the 2025 Techpreneur Summit held in Lagos, reinforcing its commitment to innovation and inclusive growth among Nigeria’s micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSMEs).
The winners include: BuyScrap, a digital marketplace for recyclable materials – N6 million; Qiqi Farms, which connects local farmers to hospitality and export markets – N4 million; Eco-Cyclers, a youth-led recycling initiative based in Enugu – N3 million
Alongside the grant awards, DBN also launched a new digital data asset, a first-of-its-kind platform aimed at enabling data-driven decisions within the MSME ecosystem.
The platform offers deep insights into business trends, sector-specific challenges, and growth opportunities—supporting smarter policymaking and targeted investments.
In his keynote address in Lagos, Tony Okpanachi, managing director/ CEO, DBN, described the event’s theme, “CTRL + SHIFT: Tech Empowered Movement for Naija,” as a strategic call to reimagine enterprise development in Nigeria.
“This isn’t just a keyboard shortcut,” he said. “It’s a mindset reset—powered by technology—to build a more inclusive, innovative, and resilient business landscape. From financing to innovation, DBN remains committed to enabling MSMEs to thrive.”
Okpanachi emphasized that the Summit aligns with DBN’s AMPLIFI Strategy, which integrates digital transformation, sustainability, and scalability into its core programs.
He highlighted initiatives such as the Digital Shift Workshops and the Eco-Innovation Challenge as key steps toward embedding innovation in Nigeria’s MSME sector.
Encouraging young innovators, he added: “The future belongs to those bold enough to imagine and build it. DBN is proud to support the ideas that will shape tomorrow.”
A major highlight was the unveiling of the DBN Data Asset—a digital platform designed to provide real-time, evidence-based insights into Nigeria’s MSME landscape.
The platform combines DBN’s proprietary data with external sources like the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) to offer a comprehensive view of MSME performance by region and sector.
Jeremy Dan Okayi, DBN’s Head of Strategy, Policy & Innovation, described the platform as: “A reservoir of insight, potential, and direction—built on two years of collaboration and shared vision. This tool will support informed decision-making across the public and private sectors.”
News
FCCPC Shuts France, Belgium, and Italy Visa Centres in Abuja Over Alleged Consumer Rights Violations
In a bold enforcement action, the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC), supported by the Nigeria Police Force and the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps (NSCDC), has sealed off the visa application centres of France, Belgium, and Italy in Abuja over alleged consumer protection breaches and obstruction of regulatory investigations.
The affected centres—located at Mukhtar El-Yakub House in the Central Business District and operated by TLS Contact, a Teleperformance Company—were shut down following reports that they refused to accept formal correspondence from the FCCPC regarding a consumer complaint. The Commission cited further infractions, including obstruction of investigation and alleged assault of its officers during lawful duties.
Speaking to journalists at the scene, Mrs. Boladale Adeyinka, Director of Surveillance and Investigations at the FCCPC, explained: “This is an enforcement operation against TLS. On March 25, 2025, we served them a letter to address a consumer complaint, which they refused to accept. Instead, TLS officers assaulted our team, and in a subsequent visit on June 17, they also allegedly assaulted uniformed police officers.”
Citing Section 33 of the Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Act (FCCPA), Mrs. Adeyinka emphasized that failure to comply with Commission directives constitutes a criminal offense, punishable by imprisonment, fines of up to ₦20 million, or both.
TLS has been ordered to appear before the Commission on June 20, 2025, to provide testimony, submit evidence, and make formal depositions. The company may be held liable for any financial losses suffered by applicants due to the disruption of visa services.
Despite multiple requests for comment, management at TLS Contact declined to respond as of press time.
Adedapo Segun, chief financial officer (CFO), Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPC), has explained why there is a missing sum of N210 trillion in the company’s audited financial statement spanning from 2017 to 2023.
According to Segun, the missing funds are cash calls requested by joint venture (JV) partners and settlement to the JVs.
He spokeat a session of the Senate Committee on Public Accounts chaired by Aliyu Wadada.
Segun was responding to an alarm raised by the committee over missing N210 trillion in NNPCL’s audited financial statement.
Recall that Wadada issued a one-week ultimatum to NNPCL to account for the missing N210 trillion.
Reacting, Segun said, “The N103 trillion and N107 trillion are made up of joint venture cash calls that have been requested by the JV operators and JV cash call payments made by NNPCL, which are yet to be reconciled because governance procedures were not done at that time.
“That is why you see the description reflecting those two items would be washed out because they are two sides of the same transaction, which is the cash calls by JV partners and the settlement by NNPCL.”
However, Habu Sadeik, a financial analyst, in a post on X on Thursday, said Segun’s response was unsatisfactory.
Saidik faulted NNPCL’s response about the fund discrepancies, noting that something is not right with the audited financial statement.
“Forget about the senators’ lack of knowledge.
“The CFO’s response is not satisfactory. Are you saying that cash calls worth hundreds of trillions are just appearing on your FS only in 2024 without 31 disclosure?
“If it’s a cash call, why hasn’t the disclosure said so?
“Which cash call is over 100 trillion?
“Something is definitely not right, and I hope they retrospectively correct that FS.
“Someone somewhere did a chef’s work,” he wrote on X.
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