Allied Food and Confectionary Services Limited announced exciting plans to launch and grow the Burger King® brand in Nigeria, the largest country in Africa.
Antoine Zammarieh, Managing Director from Allied Food and Confectionary Services Limited said,
“We are proud to bring this iconic brand to Nigeria, and believe that our Nigerian guests will love Burger King flame-grilled sandwiches and other famous Burger King® menu items, that guests can have their way,”
L-R: Executive Vice Chairman, Funds and Electronic Transfer Limited, Prof. Mustapha Akinkunmi; Group Managing Director, Allied Food and Confectionary Services Limited (franchisee of Burger King), Mr Antoine Zammarieh; Marketing Coordinator, Burger King, Ms. Ibukun Aiyemo; and Operation Coordinator, Burger King, Ricardo Minaise at the Burger King pre launch media briefing in Lagos today April 13th, 2021. | Brand Spur Nigeria
“I am pleased that with the new agreement we can not only offer our guests great-tasting Burger King® food but also contribute significantly to the economy of Nigeria by creating hundreds of new jobs.”
This launch will be a big step towards serving budding food lovers and consumers of quick-service restaurants in Nigeria with more exciting flame-grilled and speciality meals. Nigerian guests can soon look forward to enjoying world-famous Burger King® products, such as the brand’s signature Whopper® Sandwich.
“We’re excited to share big news from Nigeria, where we have announced ambitious plans for one of our iconic brands – Burger King®,” said David Shear, President International Restaurant Brands International Inc., the parent company of Burger King®.
L-R: Executive Vice Chairman, Funds and Electronic Transfer Limited, Prof. Mustapha Akinkunmi; Group Managing Director, Allied Food and Confectionary Services Limited (franchisee of Burger King), Mr Antoine Zammarieh; Marketing Coordinator, Burger King, Ms. Ibukun Aiyemo; and Director, Africa Franchise Centre, Mr Emma Esinnah, during a pre-launch press conference of Burger King in Lagos | Brand Spur Nigeria
“Nigeria has a thriving quick-service restaurant industry, and our partner has a deep understanding of the infrastructure and supply chain strategy needed in the market, which we believe will position the Burger King®brand well for success in the country.”
The first Burger King® restaurant in Nigeria is expected to open in autumn this year and the announcement reflects the global appeal of Burger King®, contributing to the brand’s expansion strategy in Africa.
British luxury carmaker, Rolls-Royce, has delivered the highest-ever first-quarter sales results in 2021, reporting a 62 per cent increase over the same period in 2020.
According to the General Manager, Marketing and Corporate Communications of Coscharis Group, the exclusive franchise owner for Rolls-Royce vehicles sales and services in Nigeria, Abiona Babarinde this was the highest sales growth in the marque’s 116-year history.
Between January 1 and March 31, the company delivered 1,380 motor cars to customers, up 62 per cent from 2020 and surpassed the previous first quarter record set in 2019.
He also noted that the growth was seen in all markets, with the strongest in China, United States, and Asia Pacific.
The statement said there was high demand for all Rolls-Royce models, particularly the new Ghost launched in 2020, and the superluxury SUV, Cullinan, with order books extending well into the second half of 2021.
Bespoke commissions also remained at record levels seen in 2020, with a number of individual examples already delivered this year, including the Koa Phantom and Iridescent Opulence Phantom.
Reflecting on the results, Chief Executive Officer, Rolls-Royce Motor Cars, Torsten Müller-Ötvös, expressed optimism for the remainder of 2021.
“With robust order books across our product range, particularly for the new Ghost and Cullinan, sales growth in key markets, and Bespoke commissions running at record levels, our business is in excellent shape. We have every reason to be optimistic for the remainder of 2021,” he said.
Müller-Ötvös appreciated the Rolls-Royce team across the globe for their contributions to delivering remarkable results.
For creators, Playlists are great for organizing your content in different themes — so you can keep viewers locked in for longer.
TikTok Playlists Feature? How does it work?
With the introduction of Playlists, you can officially say goodbye to scrolling through a creator’s page to find a specific piece of content.
TikTok’s Playlists groups select TikTok videos into themed collections.This makes videos easier to binge-watch in one sitting, with each clip carrying over to the next.
And given the fact that TikTok videos can be a maximum of 60-seconds in length, the ability to group videos together is a game-changer for longer-form storytelling on the platform.
How to Use TikTok’s Playlists Feature?
Here’s how to create your first TikTok Playlist:
Step 1: Make sure you have a Business or Creator TikTok account.
Step 2: Tap the “Me” icon on the main navigation menu and head to your profile.
Step 3: Tap the “Sort videos into playlists” prompt under your videos tab (if available).
Step 4: Add a title for your playlist (up to 15 characters long).
Step 5: Select which videos to add to your curated playlist collection.
NOTE: Only public videos can be added to a playlist, and can only live in one playlist at a time. If you set a video to private it will be removed from your playlist.
Step 6: Once you’ve picked what videos will reside in your playlist, decide on the order your videos will appear.
And that’s it!
TikTok Playlists are a great way to curate your TikTok videos for a more user-friendly viewing experience — which can help strengthen your niche and increase your video views.
Will you be using TikTok Playlists to organize your videos?
The aviation industryneeds to unify its approach to prevent cybersecurity shocks, according to a new study released today by the World Economic Forum.
The increased level of interdependencies can lead to systemic risks and cascading effects as airlines, airports, and aircraft manufacturing take different approaches to counter cyber risks.
To guard against these risks and create a streamlined approach with civil aviation authorities, the World Economic Forum has launched the Cyber Resilience in Aviation initiative in collaboration with more than 50 companies.
The latest report, Pathways to a Cyber Resilient Aviation Industry, developed in collaboration with Deloitte, outlines how the industry – from airlines to airports to manufacturing and the supply chain – can work with a common language and baseline of practices. The report focuses on mitigating the impact of future digital threats on multiple levels:
International:
· Aligning regulations globally
· Establishing a baseline of cyber resilience across the supply and value chain
· Designing an impartial assessment and benchmarking framework
· Developing international information-sharing standards
National:
· Enabling reskilling
· Rewarding more open communication on aviation incidents
Organizational:
· Integrating cyber resilience in business resilience practices
· Ensuring risk assessment and prioritization
· Improving collaboration
“The aviation industry has developed a strong track record of safety, resilience and security practices for physical threats and must integrate cyber risks into this culture of safety and resilience,” said Georges De Moura, Head of Industry Solutions, Centre for Cybersecurity, World Economic Forum. “A common understanding and approach to existing and emerging threats will enable industry and government actors to embrace a risk-informed cybersecurity approach to ensure a secure and resilient aviation ecosystem.”
“The work of the World Economic Forum on aviation cyber resilience complements these global efforts led by the ICAO and is another excellent example of the importance of broad-based international collaboration among public and private stakeholders,” said Fang Liu, Secretary-General, International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).
“Adopting a collaborative cyber-resilience stance and creating trust between cross-sector organizations, national and supranational authorities is the logical yet challenging next step,” said Chris Verdonck, Partner, Deloitte, Belgium. “However, if the effort is not collective, cyber risks will persist for all. Further solidifying an extensive and inclusive community and developing and implementing a security baseline is key to adapt to the current digital reality.”
The Cyber Resilience in Aviation initiative has enabled organizations to create plans as a community to safeguard against current and future risks. It convenes over 80 experts from more than 50 organizations across global aviation and technology companies, international organizations, trade associations and national government agencies. Major collaborators include ICAO, NCSC, EASA, IATA, ACI, Eurocontrol and UK CAA.
The recommendations and principles developed by the community have been published in a set of reports, allowing companies worldwide to learn from their insights and develop their own policies to ensure cybersecurity in aviation.
CBN data show that Nigeria’s gross official reserves declined by USD280m to USD34.82bn in March. In the name of accuracy, we should adjust this figure downwards to allow for the pipeline of delayed external payments, which the IMF estimated late last year at up to USD3bn and which the CBN has since indicated as substantially lower.
We do not view the current level of reserves as a cause for alarm because of three areas where the CBN could reinforce its defences: the firmness of the oil price (to the extent that the NNPC benefits), new multilateral loans (preferably condition-lite), and a return by the FGN to the Eurobond market (now officially on the drawing board).
We also note that, in football parlance, March was a game of two halves, rapid depletion of reserves in the first followed by a partial recovery in the second.
Total reserves at end-March covered 7.6 months’ imports of goods on the basis of the balance of payments (BoP) for the 12 months to September. The cover falls to 5.2 months when we add imported services.
Egypt has better cover than Nigeria, which we can trace to the BoP. Due to Covid-19 and the government response to it, the tourism sector took a huge hit and the deficit in services shrank to USD1.9bn in H2 ’20, compared with USD6.3bn in the year-earlier period. Nigeria, of course, has a structural deficit in services. The difference favouring Egypt is that it attracted net foreign portfolio investor (FPI) inflows of USD9.5bn in H2 ’20, reflecting the easing of global financing conditions (for the entire EM universe) and FPI confidence in its investment story.
At its spring meetings held last week jointly with the World Bank, the IMF’s managing director pushed the argument for an increase of quotas of special drawing rights (SDRs) equivalent to about USD650bn. Quotas are included in reserves and determine the limit on members’ borrowing from the Fund.
Nigeria’s is SDR2.45bn (USD3.50bn), and the FGN borrowed the maximum permitted 100% of quota from the Fund in April ’20. The focus of the debate is how to allow “voluntary post-allocation channeling” of the new SDRs across the membership. The managing director hopes to make a formal proposal to the board in June.
This year has begun encouragingly for the EM universe from the perspective of net FPI inflows. Our sister company, FBN (UK), tells us that they have amounted ytd to USD30.8bn for bonds and USD74.2bn for equities. Flows into Nigeria would have been negligible, however, given the modest daily turnover on the local bourse and the payments pipeline.
Kantar Public, a leading provider of evidence and advisory services to governments across the world has announced to expand Public Voice – the specialist panel designed to provide governments and policymakers with representative access to the public and answers to challenging policy questions – across Europe.
The panel, which provides gold standard data quality but with the cost advantages of online surveying, will be rolled out in a phased approach throughout 2021, initially covering 18 European countries. The panel’s design and recruitment methods provide data from a random sample of the population, not a self-selected one, reducing the risk of bias and avoiding unrepresentative samples.
Dr Michelle Harrison, Global President of Kantar Public, said of the announcement that “this is a significant infrastructural investment to provide the benefits of our Public Voice panel to our European clients. This expansion will offer policymakers and public sector decisionmakers with exceptionally granular insight into the experiences of the public and communities in these countries, supported by our advanced profiling and segmentation tools.”
Public Voice was developed by Kantar Public to provide government and public sector clients with high quality evidence at a competitive price point, with fully extendable capabilities to overcome location or scale constraints. The tool was first launched in the UK during the early stages of the COVID-19 pandemic and the panel size was doubled in January 2021, making it the largest random sample panel in the UK and one of the largest in the world.
More countries in Europe will be added over time, in addition to the 18 countries launching PubIic Voice this year. The tool is also available for clients in Kenya and Nigeria.
Olam Food Ingredients (OFI), a leading supplier of cocoa beans and cocoa ingredients, today announces it has established child labour monitoring across its managed sustainability programmes, covering 183,000 households in nine countries, and 100% deforestation monitoring across its direct global supply chain, covering almost 12,000 suppliers.
Both achievements are part of Cocoa Compass, OFI’s sustainability ambition for the future of cocoa. In its first impact report published today, the company confirmed that along with its 100% direct supply chain traceability target reached last year, it has hit its remaining 2020 milestones in collaboration with customers and partners and shares progress towards its 2024 and 2030 goals, which include targets on living incomes, child labour and natural capital.
The Child Labour Monitoring and Remediation System (CLMRS) developed by the cocoa business, in collaboration with the Fair Labor Association (FLA), covers 100% of its managed sustainability programmes and is a ground-breaking new tool for monitoring child labour in Cameroon, Uganda, Brazil and Indonesia.
This is a critical step towards Cocoa Compass’s goal of eradicating child labour from the cocoa supply chain by 2030. With training and the help of a smartphone, community leads, and field officers now collect detailed social data on individual farming households, helping to identify children at risk and take faster, more effective action.
This data paints a clearer picture of child labour in the supply chain and the interventions needed. For example, in Côte d’Ivoire, which has a reported high prevalence of child labour, 79% of school-aged children attend school and 75% of children identified in a situation of child labour combine school and work and in 97% of child labour cases, children were working for a parent or a relative. These findings are in line with the recent NORC study from the University of Chicago which showed that school attendance has increased significantly in Côte d’Ivoire in the past ten years, indicating that actions like establishing birth certificates, building classrooms, providing school equipment and setting up Village Savings and Loans Associations are contributing to improving access to education.
Gerard A. Manley, CEO of OFI’s Cocoa Business, said; “Child labour anywhere in the cocoa supply chain is unacceptable, but the risk has increased over the past year as schools have closed due to the pandemic. By introducing this level of monitoring across all our cocoa sourcing countries, we want to make sure that cases are identified and dealt with as quickly as possible. Our data shows that there is still a long way to go to eradicate child labour from the cocoa supply chain, but this insight is helping us to tailor our interventions to the situation on the ground and focus on how we can make the biggest impact.”
Gerard A. Manley
The cocoa business is also sharing progress towards cutting its natural capital costs for the first time today, reporting a 13% reduction in its processing operations and a 4% reduction in its agriculture operations in the year 2019/20 compared to the previous year. By 2030, it aims to reduce natural capital costs by 30% across its global cocoa supply chain.
The company is one step closer to achieving that goal after introducing satellite technology to map tree cover across its entire direct cocoa supplier network. Combining this data with historic deforestation rates, existing forest cover and national park boundaries, it can identify deforestation risk hotspots and take targeted action.
Manley continued: “Through the hard work of our teams and the support of our customers and partners, we have now achieved 100% traceability and 100% deforestation monitoring in our direct supply chain, and 100% child labour monitoring in all our managed sustainability programmes. This is just the beginning. The unprecedented level of data and insight at our fingertips will help us identify how and where to act to achieve our longer-term ambition of a professionalised and quality-focused cocoa supply chain, one where farmers are earning a living income, child labour is eliminated, and the natural world is protected.”
The Cocoa Compass report also sets out OFI’s work with Sustainable Food Lab, Global Living Wage Coalition (GLWC), the Anker Research Network and the Living Income Community of Practice to publish the first-ever living income reference values for Cameroon, Nigeria, and Papua New Guinea, as well as an updated Côte d’Ivoire level. These benchmarks will allow the cocoa business to determine the existing living income gaps in its direct cocoa supply chain and work towards its target for 150,000 farmers to be earning a living income by 2030.
All cocoa data collected by OFI, including child labour and deforestation data, will feed directly into source, the company’s sustainability insights platform, giving customers unprecedented visibility of the social and environmental impact of their cocoa, including full traceability for all of OFI’s directly sourced cocoa.
Googleunveils a Doodle to posthumously mark the 74th birthday of Nigerian music legend and highlife maestro Oliver de Coque, one of Africa’s most prolific recording artists of all time.
The Doodle, created by Lagos-based graphic artist and illustrator Ohab TBJ, pays tribute to the guitarist who died in June 2008 at the age of 61, following a heart attack. The creative inspiration was drawn from De Coque’s love for the guitar, his energetic performance style, his unique music brand, and his love of tradition and culture.
“Oliver de Coque was a popular musician from the Igbo part of Nigeria. As a kid back in the 90s, I recall my late dad playing his songs. I will never forget watching my uncles and aunts dancing to his music; their happiness was contagious”, says Ohab TBJ.
Google Doodle’s Posthumous Celebration For Oliver De Coque’s 74th Birthday-Brand Spur Nigeria
Born on this day in 1947 in the small town of Ezinifite in southern Nigeria, De Coque (whose birth name was Oliver Sunday Akanite) first took up the guitar at a young age. As a teenager, he studied the traditional Igbo music of the region, alongside Congolese soukous. In 1970, at a performance by the popular Sunny Agaga and his Lucky Star Band, Akanite convinced Sunny to let him stand in as their guitarist – and was hired on the spot.
This provided a massive boost to his fledgeling music career. Also a skilled player of the Nigerian board game okwe, the guitar genius became known as Oliver de ka Okwe, which he later adapted to become his stage name, Oliver de Coque.
Known for combining the modern West African highlife genre with Congolese-influenced guitar style, and the energetic dance elements of Igbo music with which he grew up, De Coque crafted his own unique music style which he called Ogene.
From his first solo release in 1976, De Couque’s music grew in popularity at home and abroad, and he released album after album featuring his masterful guitar work and fresh take on Africa pop. His unforgettable songs, including Biri ka Mbiri, People’s Club of Nigeria and Elete Aghara (Tolerance), continue to resonate in the hearts of millions of music lovers in Nigeria and across the world.
In 1994, De Coque was awarded an honorary doctorate in music by the University of New Orleans, in recognition of his prodigious music achievements.
“I believe that Oliver de Coque paved the way for so many African artists of this generation, and that there’s still much more we have to learn about this highlife artist. History has not done enough to honour his memory, so I hope this Doodle will help highlight his incredible story,” Ohab TBJ concludes.
In support of the accounting profession, MTN Nigeria sponsored the 50th Annual Accountants’ Conference that held from April 5 – 9, 2021 at the Abuja International Conference Centre (ICC), Abuja, Nigeria.
This year’s event themed “The Fourth Industrial Revolution: Boom for the Accounting Profession and Panacea for the Pandemic” hosts over 7,500 local and foreign delegates. The hybrid event (physical and virtual attendance) was streamed to participants who were unable to attend the event physically due to limitations posed by the COVID-19 pandemic.
Speaking at the conference, Chief Transformation Officer, MTN Nigeria, OlubayoAdekanmbi said, “We at MTN Nigeria are so proud to be identified with this honourable profession and we are glad that we are helping to drive this conversation. This is our way of ensuring that in the wake of the pandemic, practising professionals remain up to date and add value to our nation in a changing world.”
Delivering his presentation on the importance of the Internet of Things (IoT) in the Fourth Industrial Revolution, Adekanmbi stated that, “With IoT, things that take us years in our auditing, asset tracking and efficiency can be fast-tracked and accelerated. IoT allows you to reduce operational costs because you can track anything, everything, everywhere and you can serve your customers readily.”
“For IoT to work, there are certain things that are critical because it is one device talking to another device. It means that you need an internet that is super-powered and that is what broadband does effectively. MTN Nigeria has one of the fastest, accelerated broadband quality in Nigeria. A few months ago, through the honourable minister, we were able to test 5G in Nigeria.
These are the enabling infrastructure we are already experimenting with within Nigeria. Once again, through the honourable minister, we experimented with what is called E-Sim, this means you no longer need a physical sim on your phone, you can virtualize your sim. We can say that Nigeria is on the path to start enjoying the benefits of the possibility of the Fourth Industrial Revolution based on superior policy support we have enjoyed,” he added.
MTN Nigeria continues to advance its Good Togetherphilosophy, to support several Nigerian institutions to ensuring that they maintain the best standards of practice, which will lead to a better society for all.
As part of its effort in contributing to society and in fulfillment of its Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), Nimbus Media Limited, an outdoor advertising agency, has partnered with the Morainbow Down Syndrome Foundation to publicize the World Down Syndrome Day (WDSD)-a global awareness day, 21st March which has been officially observed by the United Nations since 2012.
The partnership according to the company is one of the ways it is supporting campaigns on Down syndrome, using its network of digital advertising screens at shopping malls across Nigeria.
This year’s WDSD focused on improving connections to ensure that all people with Down Syndrome can connect and participate on an equal basis with others. Awareness for the event started early in March as Nimbus media showcased models with Down syndrome on digital screens at different shopping malls in 5 states and 8 locations hereby helping to achieve the goals for the year’s WDSD.
Speaking on the successful campaign, Tola Makinwa, Executive Director, Morainbow Down Syndrome Foundation says, “Nimbus helped in reaching out to literates as well as those in the grassroots area who have down syndrome by showcasing the models which have helped to improve how those with down syndrome feel about themselves, gave them courage and moved them from the stage of denial.”
Nimbus Media Partners Morainbow Down Syndrome Foundation To Celebrate World Down Syndrome Day-Brand Spur Nigeria
According to Morainbow Down Syndrome Foundation, reviews from parents of persons with Down syndrome have so far shown that they are traumatized, need maximum support, and this CSR by Nimbus Media Limited helped to catch the attention of parents who have been keeping their children isolated because of how they looked and give them another perspective.
The foundation hopes that before the next WDSD in 2022, they would have amplified awareness through their media platform, gained more involvement from the Government, Corporate and private systems to boost outreach through funding, medical support, partnering with UNICEF, USAID, partner with modeling agencies in showcasing down syndrome models, adoption schemes, capacity building and job placement in the communities.
This partnership follows the Nimbus’ trend of partnering and promoting charities and social causes. The company hosts an annual event called “Nominate a charity” where members of the public vote for their favourite charity to receive a month worth of exposure on the company’s network of digital screens across shopping malls in Nigeria.
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