Investment Opportunities
Due to its abundance of natural resources, The Ijawland offers a variety of opportunities for profitable investment in nine economic sectors, including agriculture, energy, fisheries, infrastructure, manufacturing, research, solid minerals, tourism and transportation. These have been classified into seven investment areas of agriculture, agro-based industries, forest and agro-forestry, fishing, mineral resources, infrastructure and transportation and tourism.
Agriculture
The land and climate in Ijawland support the cultivation of both food and cash crops. These include oil palm, rubber, cocoa, rice, plantation, banana, yams, coco yams, coconut, cassava, sugar cane, sweet potatoes and pineapple.
Investment potential in this sector includes the development, production and marketing of these agricultural resources.
Agro-Basal Industries
The agricultural base of the Ijawland is extremely rich. Food and tree crops like cassava, plantain, sugar cane, coconut, oil palm, raffia palm, African mango, rubber and seasonal food crops like maize and fruits, as well as timber, which are abundant locally and can provide sources of raw materials for allied industries. This defines the need for agro-industrial development that involves the utilisation of these resources in cottage and large-scale industries to serve local needs, and also for export. Along these lines, the potential exists for establishment of a variety of industries in the state.
Mineral Resources
The Ijawland is endowed with huge deposits of mineral resources. The state is rich in crude oil and natural gas and a variety of solid minerals. These create opportunities for diverse kinds of investment in the various economic sectors including energy, manufacturing and services.
Energy Sector
Enormous investment potential exists in the energy sector in the Ijawland and comes under two sub-sectors, namely oil and gas and power generation.
Oil and Gas 
The oil and gas or petroleum sub-sector of the economy is the most prominent in Ijawland, and indeed Nigeria, because it forms the pivot of Nigeria’s economy. Oil and gas from the Niger Delta region as a whole, account for about 90 per cent of Nigeria’s foreign exchange earnings. The Ijawland contributes a major percentage of this wealth. The Ijawland’s enormous reserve of crude oil creates ample room for foreign investment.The Ijawland is a hive of oil industry activity as operators set up their facilities upland, in the swamps and creeks, and offshore. The major operators in the oil industry in the Ijawland are:-
Shell
Agip
ChevronTexaco
Consolidated Oil; and
Statoil
Opportunities abound for new investments, especially in:-
Petroleum prospecting/ refining
Gas Plants
Petro-Chemical Industries
Oil Servicing
Power Plants
Solid Minerals
The Ijawland has abundant supply of solid minerals. Solid mineral development in the Ijawland and Nigeria as a whole is receiving renewed attention following growing concerns about over-dependence on oil and gas. There are opportunities to create the following industries in the Ijawland:-
Salt Production
Sand Dredging
Clay
Infrastructure
The Ijawland is still quite underdeveloped. There are opportunities for private sector participation as well as partnership with the state governments in the region for the growth and development of the Ijawland.
There are huge investment opportunities in the areas of:-
Housing and Hospitality
Markets and Commercial Buildings
Telecommunications
Water Transportation
Ports
Forest and Agro-Forestry Resources
The rich forest resources of Ijawland offer opportunities for investment in three major areas:-
Timber and non-timber forest products
Mangrove resources; and
Conservation
The mangrove ecozone is a remarkably important habitat for birds, mammals, crustaceans and fish.
Fisheries and Aquatic Resources
Fisheries and aquatic resources are among the major natural endowments of the Ijawland. The demand for fish in Nigeria is rising due to the prohibitive costs of animal meat.
The vast water resources of Ijawland, where the sea, rivers, creeks, rivulets, lakes and swamps constitute a greater percentage of the land cover, offer enormous potential. Fishery resources in the Ijawland are exploitable for large-scale investment. Brackish, marine and inland fisheries (including swamp and lakes) produce a wide variety of fin fish and shellfish species of high food value and commercial importance.
Investment potential in fish/fishing including;-
Commercial large-scale fishing/trawling
Deep-sea fishing
Commercial aquaculture fish farming/pond development
Fresh fish preservation
Freezing, storage and export
Canning for local and export market; and
Fish oil and fish meal production.
Ijawland is indeed a land of abundant and endless opportunities.
