Marcus Amudipe
For many industrialists, the journey begins in classrooms, boardrooms, or inherited enterprises. For Dr. Olufemi Chris Akinkuebi, it began on Nigerian highways, inside trucks, warehouses, trade routes, and fragmented supply chains, where he witnessed firsthand how a consumption driven economy exports jobs and imports dependency.
Born on 4 March 1979 at Ebido Street, Yaba, Ondo, in Ondo Kingdom of Ondo State, Akinkuebi grew up in the family of Pa Samuel Olasehinde Akinkuebi, popularly known as Owoeye, and Mrs. Modupe Akinkuebi, a household rooted in discipline, resilience, and communal responsibility. He attended St. Joseph's Primary School, Oke Isegun, before proceeding to Ondo Boys' High School, completing his secondary education in 1996.
Financial hardship delayed his university education. But long before formal business education and doctoral research, Akinkuebi was already learning from the field, moving goods, managing trade relationships, and observing the inefficiencies of Nigeria's import heavy economic structure. Those formative years shaped what has now become his central economic philosophy, that nations which consume without producing merely sustain dependency.
He later earned a Bachelor of Science and Master of Science in Business Administration from Caleb University, Imota, Lagos, and is currently pursuing doctoral research in Strategic Management, focusing on industrial cluster performance. He also holds a doctoral qualification in Business Management Research and Development from the Institute of Commerce Research and Entrepreneurs Development, alongside executive training at Lagos Business School and Daystar Leadership Academy.
That philosophy now underpins some of Ondo State's most ambitious industrial initiatives, particularly the Ore Industrial Park, conceived as a productivity driven intervention aimed at repositioning the state as a manufacturing and logistics hub. In this interview with BusinessDay, Akinkuebi speaks on industrial clustering, youth participation in manufacturing, infrastructure deficits, and the governance risks that could derail long term industrial transformation.
Akinkuebi says his years in commodity movement offered an education no classroom could replicate. "Before formal education in business, I was already in the field moving products, negotiating supply chains, and seeing how fragile our production systems were," he recalls. According to him, the experience exposed a recurring pattern, where raw materials left local communities at low value only to return as expensive finished products. "That was when it became obvious to me that every truck bringing finished goods into Nigeria was carrying imported jobs. If you understand trade deeply, you understand why industrialisation is the only sustainable path."
It is this conviction that birthed the Ore Industrial Park, a public private partnership between Hessmac Industry Limited and the Ondo State Government. Spread across approximately 1,000 hectares in Ore, Ondo State, the park is strategically positioned along one of Nigeria's busiest transport corridors, linking Lagos to the eastern and northern parts of the country.
Akinkuebi says the project has moved beyond vision. "We are not speaking in theory anymore. Land has been secured. Phase one is active. Core infrastructure is being built. Independent power is central to our model because industrialisation cannot survive unstable electricity." The park is expected to attract significant phased industrial investments and create thousands of direct and indirect jobs across manufacturing and support services.
Unlike conventional industrialisation attempts centred around isolated mega factories, Akinkuebi says the Ore model is built around clusters. His reasoning is straightforward. "One factory can create jobs, yes. But clusters create ecosystems. They build supplier networks, service chains, logistics support, and knowledge transfer." For Ondo, he argues, the model is particularly suited because of the state's natural resource base. "We have timber, agricultural products, strategic location, and transport access. The cluster model allows us to integrate those comparative advantages."
While the park's long term blueprint spans multiple sectors, including plastics, furniture, packaging, LPG, vehicle assembly, and dairy, Akinkuebi says agro processing remains the most advanced. "That is where the raw material advantage is strongest today." Wood processing and furniture manufacturing are also progressing, leveraging Ondo's timber resources, while packaging is emerging as a key supporting industry. Some sectors, however, remain medium term plays. "Industrialisation is phased. Not everything moves at once."
One of the strongest arguments for industrial clusters, Akinkuebi says, is their ability to democratise access to production. Nigeria's youth population is energetic but structurally excluded from manufacturing because machinery, land, and capital remain prohibitively expensive. "Our model allows young entrepreneurs to plug into shared infrastructure. Instead of spending millions to own machinery outright, they can access industrial equipment, space, and technical support." The process begins with registration, product assessment, and integration into a support framework that connects entrepreneurs to financing and mentorship. "The idea is simple, remove the barriers and let productivity grow."
Yet converting underused public assets into productive hubs remains difficult. "The biggest challenge has been institutional inertia. Many public assets are idle, but unlocking them requires legal clarity, political alignment, and long term commitment." This thinking also informs the Renewed Hope Productivity Clusters, a framework designed to organise informal and semi structured economic participants into scalable production ecosystems.
Beyond Ore lies an even broader long term vision. Akinkuebi is involved in strategic thinking around future productivity linked urban and industrial developments designed to integrate manufacturing, logistics, trade, housing, and infrastructure. He describes such projects as requiring layered capital structures. "Projects of this scale require private equity, infrastructure finance, institutional partnerships, and long term patient capital." He acknowledges that large scale development projects in Nigeria often attract scepticism. "That scepticism is understandable. But when development is productivity linked rather than speculative, the economics become fundamentally different."
Industrial clusters in Nigeria have historically struggled under weak governance, power shortages, and financing gaps. Akinkuebi says those lessons informed the Ore model. "We dealt with power first. That is why energy infrastructure came before mass occupancy. If you ignore foundational systems, the entire model collapses." His doctoral research reinforced that observation. "Business gives intuition. Research gives evidence. What my study confirmed is that capital alone does not sustain industrial ecosystems. Trust, policy consistency, and institutional coordination are just as important."
Still, for all the planning, he says the biggest threat remains political. "Policy discontinuity is the real risk. Industrialisation takes time, but politics often changes priorities too quickly." Macroeconomic instability, especially exchange rate volatility, is another concern. "When machinery costs fluctuate unpredictably, investor confidence weakens."
Akinkuebi's interest in governance extends beyond business. He is the founder of Itesiwaju Ondo Team, a socio political movement built around people centred development and practical intervention in education, healthcare, infrastructure, and economic empowerment. It reflects the same philosophy driving his industrial work, that leadership, like production, must be measured by what it delivers. At home, he has been married to Mrs. Morenike Akinkuebi for nearly two decades, and the couple have three children.
For Akinkuebi, success is about reshaping Ondo State's economic identity. If the Ore Industrial Park succeeds, he sees a state transformed from a largely resource exporting economy into a production driven one. "Youth unemployment falls. Agriculture becomes industrial, not subsistence. Export volumes increase. Rural communities become economically relevant. Government revenues improve without excessive taxation."
In a country where industrial policy often collapses under weak execution, Akinkuebi's wager is both simple and ambitious. Build productive ecosystems, and prosperity will follow. Whether Nigeria is ready for that future remains uncertain. But his bet is clear. Ondo State can become one of the places that proves it.
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