The Nigerian Railway Corporation (NRC) said herders and traders would resume moving their cattle from the northern region to the southern region of Nigeria using rail services hours after President Bola Tinubu announced the creation of a new Ministry for Livestock Development.
On Wednesday, NRC Managing Director Fidet Okhiria disclosed this on Channels Television’s The Morning Brief breakfast show, stating that the movement of cows and other goods would resume with the Warri-Itakpe route.
It’s important to note that the NRC, primarily known for passenger traffic, had to suspend the transportation of cows by rail in 2017 due to specific technical challenges.
However, Okhiria said herders could move their cattle on the Warri-Itakpe train services in one or two months, and he assured the public that the NRC would modernise the transportation of goods in the country.
He said the NRC had obtained some rail coaches that could mobilise livestock.
They are being assembled in the Kajola area of Oyo State in the southwest,” he said.
We’ve built 15 wagons for livestock, and maybe in the next month or two, they will be deployed from Itakpe to Warri to drive the economy, the NRC boss added.
Speaking on the benefits of the ongoing development, Okhiria said investment in railways should be for the social and economic benefits of the people and not be profit-oriented in naira and kobo.
You are not developing transportation because you want to make profit in terms of naira and kobo, but the profit will come indirectly if we can move goods and link cities, he said.
He further stated that the indirect earnings might not be directly distributed to the government. Still, it would flow into the economy, adding that such investment in rail infrastructure should be for the public good and to make lives comfortable for the masses to have a robust and vibrant economy.
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