Worried about the high cost of cement in the country, the Federal Government has directed the Raw Materials Research and Development Council (RMRDC) to find a lasting solution to the problem.

The Minister of state for science and technology, Dr. Alhassan Bako Zaku, wondered why the country so blessed with abundant mineral resources still has to depend on importation to meet its local demand.
It could be recalled that contractors in the country had alleged sabotage as the reason for the artificial scarcity of the cement, which has led to the high cost.

Zaku who spoke during a familiarization visit to RMRDC in Abuja expressed concern that Nigerians are not happy over the development and that the council needs to explore its potentials to tackle the challenges posed to it by maximizing our local raw materials instead of depending on importation.
"We don’t know why it is so if we have a long list of projects done and people still have not felt it."
"I wonder why we have the raw materials, but still import almost everything we use in this country". Is it that there is no linkage between the council and those importing everything," the minister queried.
Responding, the Director General, RMRDC, Professor Peter Onwualu maintained that the nation has what it takes to produce some finished products on its own and that the council has documents to guide would-be investors.

He revealed that the council had embarked on resource-based projects such as tomato processing, mushroom production, snail production and others as part of its mandate to promote the growth of process technology and resource-based industries in the country.

He noted that the council has been playing increasing advisory role with respect to federal government policy formation and implementation on industrial raw materials, tariff regimes and import deletion/inclusion matters.

Onwualu appealed to the ministry to increase the council’s allocation to enable it perform its statutory duties even as he said that the council is exploring possible areas in order to improve its financial position.

In recent times (2006), the quarterly grants the council received have been much lower than expected. This has adversely affected our programmes," he said.