Nigeria could save about $1bn in foreign exchange annually and create 110,000 direct jobs by achieving self-sufficiency in sugar production, the National Sugar Development Council has said, as the government seeks to reduce import dependence and deepen domestic manufacturing.

Speaking at the just concluded 32nd Nigerian Economic Summit in Abuja, the council’s Executive Secretary and Chief Executive, Kamar Bakrin, said the industry could contribute to employment, rural development and foreign exchange conservation if the government’s industrial ambitions translated into sustained investment.

“Nigeria’s most pressing priorities are well known: jobs, especially for young people; rural livelihoods; security, pressure on foreign exchange; food security; and the cost of living,” he said in a statement on Wednesday.

The ambition highlights the scale of the challenge facing Africa’s most populous country, where domestic sugar production remains a fraction of consumption despite years of efforts to develop the industry. Nigeria consumes about 1.7 million metric tonnes of sugar annually, while output was estimated at 105,000 tonnes in the 2025/26 marketing year, according to the United States Department of Agriculture’s Foreign Agricultural Service.

The agency projected sugar imports at 2.03 million tonnes during the period, including raw sugar for refining and refined sugar measured in raw sugar equivalent, underscoring the country’s continued reliance on overseas supplies.

The National Sugar Development Council says the Nigeria Sugar Master Plan 2.0 could help reverse that dependence, with recent macroeconomic reforms improving the investment case for local production.

Under the master plan, the council aims to achieve domestic self-sufficiency in sugar, a shift that Bakrin said could save about $1bn in foreign exchange each year and generate 110,000 direct jobs, primarily in rural communities, sugar estates, mills and farms supplying cane to processors.

The expansion strategy rests on attracting investment into cultivation and processing, an approach intended to move the industry beyond its longstanding dependence on imported raw sugar.

He said investors are expanding existing production facilities and have committed to reaching annual output of 1.22 million tonnes by 2030, two years ahead of the master plan’s target. New sugar projects are expected to contribute a further 830,000 tonnes of annual capacity by the same year.

Together, the projects would represent potential annual capacity of 2.05 million tonnes. The figures, however, are investment commitments and projected capacity rather than evidence that Nigeria has already achieved that level of production.

The gap between ambition and current output remains substantial. In March 2026, the USDA reported that domestic production met less than five per cent of Nigeria’s sugar consumption, citing high production costs, inadequate infrastructure, limited investment and inconsistent policy implementation as constraints.

The master plan seeks to address the shortfall by encouraging companies that import raw sugar to invest in local sugarcane cultivation and processing. Its success will depend on whether proposed projects can move from commitments to commercially viable production at scale.

Beverage manufacturers are among Nigeria’s largest industrial consumers of sugar, making the availability and cost of the commodity important to the economics of domestic production. A stronger local supply chain could reduce exposure to imported inputs while creating opportunities for farmers and other businesses linked to sugar processing.