Joseph Bakare/Ijeoma Agudosi
A total of £6.5 billion worth of crude oil was imported by Spain from Nigeria in 2014, the Spanish ambassador to Nigeria, Alfonso Sebastian de Erice revealed.
He said despite the smooth economic relations with Nigeria, his country was however looking at avenues to diversify its demand such that oil and gas would cease to be her dominant trade with Nigeria.
Sebastian de Erice while speaking during a courtesy call on the House of Representatives speaker Yakubu Dogara added that Spain would be ready to assist Nigeria revive its non-functional refineries to boost local production.
“Spain is one of the partners of Nigeria, the first or the second best client. We buy £6.5 billion of oil and gas. We are very happy with the exchanges that we have, we need the oil but we want to diversify because we think it’s very important that our economic relations do not be only in gas and petrol, we have to diversify.
“We want to cooperate with you in agriculture, we have very good agricultural industry, we have comparative advantage in tourism, manufacturing, you have people who are very well prepared,” he said.
Dogara assured the ambassador of Nigeria’s readiness for the continued development of trading, tourism, mineral resources and other sectors towards providing employment between the two countries.