Kano Economic City takes shape on 117 hectares with 12,000 shops planned
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The Kano Economic City project at Dangwauro, along the Kano-Zaria Highway, is being developed on 117 hectares with plans for 80,000 square metres of warehousing and 12,000 shops and stalls, with several blocks already completed and occupied.
The Kano Economic City project, located at Dangwauro Town along the Kano-Zaria Highway, is being built on 117 hectares of land with plans for about 80,000 square metres of warehousing and 12,000 shops and stalls, as Kano moves to consolidate its position as northern Nigeria's commercial centre.
The project is designed to decongest the prime areas of the ancient city and is planned to include a pharmaceutical market equipped with duplex suites, customised warehousing and a loading bay; a textile market with a food court; a logistics hub with parking spaces, hotels and a trailer park; the Kanawa Container Terminal; and the KEC arena, which is to feature a walk path, five-a-side football pitches, indoor games and a viewing centre.
Several components are already at various stages of completion. The pharmaceutical market, known as the Coordinated Wholesale Centre, has two blocks of two-storey buildings, A and B, completed and occupied, while blocks C and D are complete with basements but not yet occupied. Block E is nearing completion and construction is expected to begin on block F. There are 384 shops for each block, A to E, at the Kanawa pharmaceutical market.
Pharmaceutical companies relocated to the Coordinated Wholesale Centre after it was commissioned by then Minister of Health Dr Osagie Ehanire in February 2023, and regulatory and security agencies including the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control, the Pharmaceutical Society of Nigeria and the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency have offices at the market to oversee activity there.
The next phase is the ICT hub, whose GSM market is planned with 731 non-duplex shops on the ground floor and 584 on the first floor and is expected to attract more than 2,000 shop owners; works have reached advanced stages but are not yet complete. An Agric Hub with a commodity exchange market, inputs and agro-allied sections, research and development facilities and silos is planned, although no development has started on it, while the textile market is to begin where the famous Kantin Kwari market stops.
The project is presented as a way to modernise trading infrastructure in Kano and shift commerce away from congested inner-city markets as more blocks are completed and handed over.