THE National Social Security Fund (NSSF) is planning to revive the National Milling Corporation (NMC) mills and granaries across the country - in line with the industrialisation initiative spearheaded by President John Magufuli, it was revealed in Arusha.
According to the NSSF Director-General,
Professor Godius Kahyarara, the pension fund will invest over 34bn/- to
revive the state milling and grain storage facilities in Kyela District,
Mbeya Region, Iringa, Dodoma and Mwanza with the four factories said to
be valued at 80bn/-.
“The NMC factory at Iringa is in fact
already operating - milling and packaging maize meal (flour), which
sells cheaply at just 40 per cent of the market price,” said the NSSF
chief, adding that the fund, in its five-year development strategy, will
ensure that all NMC mills in the four regions are reclaimed, revived
and put into active production.
Speaking during the occasion to
inaugurate Mafao House, a commercial complex built by the NSSF as well
as the PPF Plaza built by PPF Fund in Arusha, the Minister responsible
for Policy, Parliament, Labour, Youth, Employment and the Disabled, Ms
Jenista Mhagama, said a grand plan that will see social security schemes
invest in new factories will be rolled out at the end of this month.
“While NSSF is working to revive the NMC
facilities, I am on the other hand planning a joint meeting with all
pension funds in the country to plan the establishment of new factories
in the country, as well as reviving old but potential ones; the
president’s initiative to make Tanzania an industrialised country is not
a joke.
In a few years’ time, this is going to
be the case,” she said. On his part, President Magufuli assured all
pension schemes that plan to invest into factories and other productive
industries that the government will give them a five-year tax holiday to
help them gain ground.
“Many foreign investors have in the past
enjoyed tax holidays; this time it is our own enterprises that will
benefit from such incentives to boost local investments,” the president
stressed.
While NMC granaries and mills are being
revived in Mwanza, Mbeya, Iringa and Dodoma regions, it is still not
known what will happen to the National Milling facilities located in the
Unga Limited section of this city.
The NMC property is being used by a
local miller, Philemon Mollel, through his Monaban Company Limited.
Meanwhile, when NSSF together with its counterpart, the PPF Fund jointly
invited Dr Magufuli to inaugurate their two new commercial complexes in
Arusha; they probably expected the president to be impressed.
He was not. “While these two high-rise
buildings may look beautiful to the eye, the amount invested into their
constructions could have been channelled into better projects such as
industrial premises and factories, to boost employment and increase
state revenues,” the president pointed out.
He reminded pension fund officials that
the rate of occupancy in the commercial buildings was astoundingly low,
which reduced the towering structures into white elephant projects.
Dr Magufuli noted that the 60 billion/-
invested by the two schemes for both buildings could instead have
financed a number of factories to boost production for both local and
export markets.
