The Country Director of Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, Jeremie Zoungrana disclosed this on Tuesday, when he led a team of the Foundation on a courtesy visit to the Minister of Budget and National Planning, Sen. Atiku Bagudu in Abuja.
He said the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation considered Nigeria as one of its important partners in Africa and has been in the country for more than 10 years, doing several programs on polio vaccine and other health issues like malaria.
He also said that the Foundation has plans to improve upon the health of Nigerians because it believed that healthy populace will contribute immensely to economic growth of the country.
“This visit is to connect, work with the minister and to draw from his wisdom. “We want to make sure part of Nigerians’ problems are shared with us. Because of this we have invested $2 billion on Nigeria in the last few years.
“We are going to expand our investment and continue to strengthen malaria and polio vaccines and also access to maternal and child health.”
“Another area if interest is agriculture and food security. We will initiate plans to empower Nigerian farmers with agro processing inputs.
“We are equally going to prioritise women and gender equality.”