In its efforts to meet the Presidential Metering Initiative, the Federal government said it has targeted a minimum acquisition and installation of 2 million meters annually within the next five years.
The Minister of power, Mr Adebayo Adelabu, disclosed this during a facility tour of Metering Solutions Manufacturing Services in Onna Local Government Area of Akwa Ibom State.
Adelabu, who identified metering as one of the infrastructure deficits militating against steady electricity in the country, lamented that Nigeria metering gap is over 7 million which is about 47 per cent meter penetration.
He said that President Bola Tinubu led administration is committed to bridging the metering gap in the country through the Presidential Metering Initiative.
He said: "The major deficit is metering penetration, which today is less than 50 per cent of total customers in electricity consumers
"We have 13 million registered electricity consumers whose meters have not been installed. Today, it is below six million. So, we have about seven million meter gap, that is about 47 per cent meter penetration. That is the major issue to the sector, if you do not meter customers you cannot bill them and if you do not bill you cannot collect.
"So, its affecting the sector and there is losses and the collecting end of the losses is metering and we believe is a major hiccup in the power sector. A lot of Nigerians pay on estimated bill, this is not only unfair, it is unjust, it is evil because in estimated bill, there is no transparency, there is no sincerity.
"Nigerians are complaining and the metering is an avenue for DisCos to make for their lost revenue. And we have made a lot numbers of DisCos to make a lot of refunds to customers.
"So, we are saying that the best way to go is to reduce this meter gap. President Bola Tinubu under his renewed hope agenda has vowed to do anything that will impact positively on the life of the people.
"We have a target of a minimum of acquisition and installation of two million meters annually over the next five years. That is the minimum target we are given.That is 10 million meters and we are already taking steps to achieve this in terms of funding, recovery strategy."
Speaking while giving a brief presentation of the company, the General Manager, Metering Solutions Manufacturing Services, Mr Tolulope Ogunkolade, said that the company which was established and commissioned in 2017 has made significant progress.
He said "We have under gone equipment upgrade across all the segment of the factory since 2022. We are consistently going to produce and maintain 99.9 per cent quality assurance.
"As we speak today, we do not do much of the inspection in the factory because inspection comes as an additional cost to the business.
"So, we make at every process of operation, we have our built in quality control parameters and initiatives that enable us to ensure that when a product is getting out at the end of the day, we are sure that the product is in conformity with total Nigerian metering code and also in conformity with Nigerian smart code and in conformity with the regulators.
"We also planned to bring up robots because to produce 2.3 million meters in 12 months come with a lot of manpower requirements, but by the time we integrate robots into our operations it will definitely give us that mileage to accomplish the target within 12 months period", he added.
