By Peter Duru, Makurdi

The Group Managing Director of the Benue Investment Property Company, BIPC, Dr Raymond Asemakaha has disclosed that over 3,588 direct and indirect jobs have been created by the firm through its subsidiaries in the last two years to ease unemployment in the state.

He said more of the jobs would be created in the coming weeks and months as as work on other subsidiaries including the beer factory and juice production plants commence production.

The Group Managing who made this known  Tuesday while interacting with newsmen at the NUJ House in Makurdi noted that the establishment of a nail factory, bakeries, customised polythene production and water plants by the company had helped to stabilise the price of nail, bread and packaged water in the state.
He pointed out that the subsidiaries had helped to drive down unemployment rate in the state saying “a total of 580 staff were employed in the companies while over 3,008 indirect jobs were created in the economy of the state.

“These companies have helped to control the price of bread and packaged water which were almost going out of the reach of the people.”

He disclosed that work on the Company’s justice factory was already at advanced stage and would become operational October 1, 2025.

He said when operational, the plant which would be producing orange and mango juice would go a long way to off-take the raw materials from Benue farmers and also ensure price stability for the products.

According to him, “We have installed the juice factory. It is going to start production precisely on October 1, 2025. We are expecting the manufacturer to come in the month of August to test run it so that we would start producing the orange and Mango juice.

“We want to set a standard and by the time we start we would determine the price of oranges in Nigeria. Benue has the best orange and mango and our people take it to the North and give them away at unreasonable price. So we want to halt that and if they want to buy, they can come to Benue and purchase at our own price which is one of the things we are doing.

“The factory would also employ about 400 staff  providing direct Jobs and I have gotten partners from European that would come to run the factory as it is highly technical while our team would be part of the management staff.”

He further noted that the construction work on the new Benue Brewery “is at 84 percent completion stage  and would also create 1,000 jobs.

The Group Managing Director who also explained that the brewery under construction when completed would make use of locally produced grains among others urged farmer to go into massive production of the raw materials.

On the sustainability of the companies after his exit from office, Dr. Asemakaha dismissed the old insinuation that government had no business managing businesses citing Akwa Ibom Airlines and some companies in China saying “the problem is the character and perception of the business managers.

“The problem with BIPC in the past is putting wrong people in place. They thought that the place is a cash cow and they have come to milk it. I am already training those under me on how to manage business investment. So even after me the companies would flourish.”

He suggested that the companies should be incorporated into limited liability companies where the state government would own 50 percent of the shares while 50 percent would go to the people.

The Group Managing Director also urged Benue youths to dedicate time to acquire one skill or the other saying “skill is what is driving the the economy today and not paper qualification. I advise our youths to take to trade and skill acquisition even with their paper qualification to enable them partake fully in the new economic reality of the time.”