Renewable energy resources including the use of solar electricity holds promise in Nigeria, as energy crisis hit the oil-rich nation, a top official of the African Development Bank has said.
“As the cost of diesel keeps rising, Nigeria should consider solar electricity for villages and small towns to meet the Millennium Development Goals,” the ADB Country Programme Officer, Mr. Sturmheit Peter, said on Wednesday in Abuja.

High oil prices in the international market have raised diesel prices by more that N100 in Nigeria.
Peter said most projects in the rural areas requiring diesel generators as a source of power were becoming less cost effective in terms of running operations. He called on the ADB to learn from solar-based powered projects in the country including the Health IV project in Yobe state that is powered by solar energy.

In his assessment at the ongoing Country Portfolio Performance Review of the ADB organised by the Nigerian country office, Peter said most of the projects had too many components in their design, which some times translated into many contracts.

According to him, Project Preparation Fund by the ADB is still insufficient and the bank‘s internal approval for the fund is still complex, thereby creating delays in implementation. He said some of the development projects faced delays as some states were reluctant to provide counterpart funding, citing projects such as the provision of feeder roads to agricultural project sites. He said there was a need for more synergy in project design and implementation between the ADB and the communities, noting that lessons from past experiences in some regions would help to ease the burden of delays.

On the ADB‘s Rural Access and Mobility project, Peter said there was a need to limit project categories and limit project contracts so as to have a faster implementation period. He said contractors should be paid based on the quality of roads they had completed, rather than the distance of the roads.

The National Project Coordinator, Fadama, Dr. Adetunji Oredipe, said, “it takes two years for ADB projects to become effective in the country.“Even in small contracts, we sometimes have difficulties like suggestions that a N60, 000 contract should be advertised in the newspapers, when the cost of an advert is more than the total sum of the contract.”

“Approval is always sought from the ADB headquarters in Tunis for almost all procurement items and it takes time to process all these issues in Tunis", he added.