Nigeria Needs a National Transport Policy — Minister

The minister of transport,  Alhaji Ibrahim Bio has  emphasized the need for a national transport policy for the country. He said this when he delivered a key note address at a seminar on ‘Effective Transport Safety in Nigeria’. The seminar, a brainchild of Shipping Consult and Maritime Services was held at metropolitan Hotel Calabar.
According to him, there is an increasing demand for integrated or multimodal transport services including combinations of the road, rail, water, air and pipelines modes.
Although each mode has its unique economic, institutional and operational characteristics, they all perform the same function of moving goods as well as people from place to place, he observed.
As a service, transport, whether it is movement of goods or people is a derived demand, and is a means of serving other objectives and therefore the need for safety to promote confidence in the service.
The minister who was represented by Rector, Maritime
Academy of Nigeria, (MAN), Oron, Mr Nsenyen Ebong stated that it has been reported that globally the highest number of human lives are lost through transportation activities either on land, water, or air.
Unfortunately, these statistics have also indicated very unfavorable number for Nigeria hence, the relevance of this seminar in bringing all stakeholders to discuss existing and other relevant measures for improving transportation safety in Nigeria, he added .