"Economics of Greenfield Urban Planning" with Vernon Henderson from London School of Economics

Welcome to the new Books Network. Welcome to the Ideas Letter Podcast, a project of the Open Society Foundations. We speak with thinkers and practitioners, exploring unconventional and heterodox ideas from around the world. Each episode features authors who challenge assumptions, provoke new ways of thinking, and help us engage beyond borders. A member of the Ideas Workshop sits down with someone, whose book invites us to expand our understanding of a myriad of important topics. To learn more and keep the conversation going, make sure to subscribe to the podcast feed or visit the Ideas Letter. Now, pull up a chair and join the workshop. Hello everyone, I'm Aisha Osori, Director in Open Society Foundations Ideas Workshop. Welcome to Open Society Ideas on the new Books Network. Today we'll be talking to Noah Sarawiewa about her latest book, The Burning Ground, Oil and Militancy in Nigeria. Now Noah Sarawiewa is an author and journalist, born in Potsachot, Nigeria, and raised in London. She's a graduate of Kings College London and Columbia University, New York. She's the author of three books, the first looking for Trans Wonderland, Travels in Nigeria, which was selected as BBC Radio's fourth book of the week in 2012. The second book, Black Ghost, explores the African community in China and was named the Edward Stanford Travel Book of the Year in 2025. And her latest book is the one that we're discussing today, Burning Ground, Oil and Militancy in Nigeria, which is about the social and environmental effects of the insurgency that arose in Nigeria's oil-rich-ninja delta after the death of her father, the environmental activist Ken Sarawiewa. For a more detailed bio, please head to the notes for this podcast. So Noah, welcome to Open Society Ideas on the new book's network and thank you for joining me to talk about critical mineral wealth, mining, global warming, environmental degradation, politics, capitalism and all the other themes in your book. Thank you. Thank you so much for having me. You're welcome. So I'm going to just jump right in and the first question is, what's the background to this book? Why did you rate it? What was the trigger? And broadly, what is it about? I once derived a book because it's been 30 years since my father was killed and I feel that the issues still haven't been resolved. And in an age when solar power is on the rise and we're seeing lots of instability around the oil industry, especially with the US attacking Iran, I think it's more important than ever that we switch to solar power. And I think the story in the Niger Delta really is a cautionary tale to all countries or oil producing countries. And this story really shows how corruption and corporate neglect can create so many problems, but end up hurting everyone. It's not just the people of the Niger Delta that get hurt, but ultimately it's that all companies suffer and the government suffers as well. I felt it was important to retell this story. Thank you. It's really important. And thank you for also bringing in what's going on in Iran. Of course, everybody's talking about oil. So back to the Niger Delta. What are the key ideas and theories behind the Niger Delta struggle for resource control? I mean, you're already in talking about the book writ large. You mentioned the fact that people are moving or we should as a world be moving away from oil towards so long, other forms of renewable energy. So what are the key ideas and theories behind the Niger Delta struggle for resource control? Well, ever since World War II was discovered in 1958, the revenues from that oil went to the federal government, which has done very little to diversify the economy and just helped Nigeria grow as an economy. And as a result, you've seen this impoverishment within the Niger Delta. At the same time, oil companies such as Shell and Agip were causing thousands of oil spills. Between 1976 and 1996, we saw over 4,600 oil spills. And without a government that's protecting its people and imposing regulations, it meant that these oil companies were under no obligation to clean up the mess. The Niger Delta is a very rich fertile wetland system. We've relied on farming and fishing for thousands of years. The land, the soil, is our wealth. And when you take that away from us and you're not replacing it with any other sort of economy, you end up with the kind of problems that we see today. And my father, Ken Saro, he wanted to address those problems. He felt that we weren't getting enough revenue as a people under the derivation principle. And he was also upset at the pollution that was being caused by these oil spills. Of course, when he fought against the government on this, he and eight of us colleagues were killed because they represented a threat to the government. And their deaths basically sent a message to the people of the Niger Delta that peaceful protest doesn't pay. And it sparked off two decades of militant activity. You saw people arming themselves and trying to get their message out to the government through violent means. At the same time, because there was so much poverty, you have people attacking the pipelines, accessing the crude oil in order to refine it for themselves. Because at that time Nigeria didn't really have any oil refineries. We were exporting crude oil and then importing it at a very high price, which is a bit like selling ice to Eskimos really. So as a result, people just couldn't afford the basic kerosene, paraffin, diesel. And it's basically sparked off this huge industry of illegal refining, which still goes on to this day. And so the problems are just proliferated. The illegal refining is then further damaging the pollution as much as the sort of corporate neglect of pipelines that has done. Which is then exacerbated the problem. It's made life even tougher for farmers. And then at the same time, the government in order to appease these militants, it's introduced an amnesty in 2008. And ever since then, it's been paying these reformed militants a monthly stipends in order to pacify them and keep them an income. And this program was only supposed to last for a few years. If you take it away, then you're going to have a return of the violence that we saw in the run up to the Amnesty in 2008, 2009. And so the government is now being forced to constantly pay money in order to keep the peace. At the same time, you still have this illegal refining going on, which is damaging the environment. And then companies like Shell have divested from the mainland because they're being constantly held to account for their actions. So no one is winning here. And I feel that a shift to solar power is what we need quite a lot of money. Thank you for that. And that's such a very profound statement. Peaceful protest does not pay. This model of peaceful protest not paying has obviously been adopted, not just by the people of the 90s, but by Nigerians all across the country. And when we think about the insecurity that's driven by kidnapping bandits, terrorists, jihadists, and also, as you say, a proliferation of violence all across the country. And it's all being traded in. And so you see the government negotiations, but it's paying kidnapping ransom. So you're right. We unfortunately started this in the 90s, the delta, the system of not allowing peaceful protest to make a difference. Now everybody's selling violence. And that's why we are in this very deep insecurity. And it comes down to lack of state's accountability, the loss of the monopoly of the use of violence by the state. It's also state violence. Where violence is not necessarily the answer or the way to engage things. It's lack of adherence, the international standards is destroying the economy, destroying Earth. I read your book on this. There's some really beautiful passages in there where you talk about just the floor around the corner of the 90s and just how beautiful you know, I confess that I'm not really traveled very widely across the 90s, but I've been to Portugal for a few times. I've been to Bonnie and your book made me want to visit, but made me want to go and visit the reserve that you mentioned. I was just like, I can't remember the name. I don't know if you remember the name, but yeah, I was like, I definitely want to visit that. So again, just a really, really, really powerful overview of just what's wrong with Niger. But what's your assessment though, in terms of a size from one thing or two, transit away from oil and obviously if you, it's not just Nigeria that needs to transit from all of the entire world, but we're also seeing the way in the world where there's certain type of ideology that's very determined to hold onto capitalism, neoliberalism in the way that we've been practicing it to the detriment of the environment. So you can see the President Trump rolling back all the gains that had, you know, the world had tried to make in terms of climate change and trying to deal with the overheating earth. So Nigeria alone is not going to be able to make this transition. We need some sort of global collaboration, global consensus. So I want to bring that down to the struggle in the 90 delta. I know you've said that violence has predominated and people are being paid to keep their tools down or keep their weapons down. But with the devastating environmental degradation and the link to what else is happening around the world, do you think there are more Nigerians that are in support of this campaign in the 90 delta for not just resource control, but also to clean up the damage? Is I be seen over time more people in support less people neutral? It's a mix. I mean, I don't know in terms of actual numbers. So you've got people in a Goni land where I'm from who are actually calling for a return to oil extraction. My father, of his campaign, he was able to drive out shell in 1993. So they haven't been operating or extracting oil in Goni land in all that time. But you now have people calling for a resumption of that extraction, which is really alarming. And really an insult to my father's memory and everything he died for. But at the same time, you have other people who are very interested in solar power. I mean, I was the consultant on a project that recently installed solar power in a community called Umorlu in Delta State. And I visited that community last year. And it's great. They've just completely pivoted and they're not using oil anymore. But obviously there are people who are making a lot of money from oil within the Niger Delta. Illegal refining in itself is a huge business. There's a hierarchy. You've got people at the top who are running these illegal refineries, which are located in forests, very remote in forests. Then you've got a hierarchy of people right down to the bottom who are the actual refiners themselves doing the very dirty and dangerous work of refining this oil and their risk of being burnt, killed and explosions. But all of these people are earning money. I mean, I spoke to one such guy, his name is Barry Zondun. This is back in 2019 and he was an illegal refiner. And he was making very decent money compared to other people. And he used that money to support his family, his siblings and his grandmother, who ironically was a farmer struggling to maintain the kind of yields that she enjoyed in previous decades. So you could see how this is this kind of vicious circle. So yeah, oil is such an integral part of our economy and illegally refined oil is an integral part. I mean, there are even companies that rely on illegal oil. It's really quite shocking. I'm not talking about proper legitimate companies, but are using it. You mentioned that we don't have any refineries. Once upon a time, we're supposed to have like three, four refineries. All of them are not working. Now we're all relying on dongle tears refinery. But we also have these huge import bills. Are you saying that between the importation and the defunct refineries that don't work, we just don't have enough. And so these illegal refineries are actually meeting a market need. That's what it sounds like. Yeah, I mean, the oil that's coming in that we import is expensive. And so also, I just think the economy in itself, this illegal refined oil, there were so many actors involved in it. We've got politicians and military officials who were involved. And then you've got oil bunkering where this illegally refined oil is then exported to other countries. Oil bunkering is not just taking crude oil and trying to sell it. It's also selling refined products. Selling refined products. It's then taken in boats out into the sea, the bite of Benin, where it then meets ships and it's loaded onto ships that are owned by different countries. We're talking Japan, Brazil. I was told by a journalist. Unfortunately, he was now passed away Patrick Nabata and he was very stiff involved in Niger Delta issues, environmental issues. He said that if you go to the prisons in Pusarcot, it's filled with sailors from all these different countries who were operating ships that were loading oil that's been illegally refined. This is a problem that has so many tentacles and there were so many people who profit from it. It's not just poor residents of the Niger Delta, foreign countries and high ranking government officials. Yeah, what you've described is like an international trade really pretty much in illegally refined goods. And then there's the崩grant aspect of stealing the crude oil from pipelines. So it's the whole ecosystem and I remember jotting down this point that you had made that the people who running these illegal refineries are earning up to $900 a month. And when you think about that, the minimum wage in Nigeria per month is barely $50. Of course, how are you going to stop people involved in industry or a sector that's earning them $900 a month? When you have these individuals who earn so much money, you have this sort of pyramid system where you've got these people at the top and then everyone else at the bottom is relying on them. And so much of the Nigerian economy is based on that. It's the big man, you know, sometimes the big woman who has the resources and everyone has to sort of cow-tow around them and relies on them desperately. And again, this is, you know, this is another way in which solar power could, solar power could really change that. With solar power, people have access to an energy resource that's clean, that's one day will be relatively cheap. And they can all run their own businesses. You know, and that's what we need. We need an economy where you've got millions of individual stakeholders who are not lying on that one big man for their livelihood. Thank you for that. And we'll go back to the solar power. But I just wanted to finish up on this economy of illegal, bond-creen and illegal refinery. What does this type of money in the hands of people who have, who can be violent, who have been violent? What is advertising to our democracy or to what we're trying to build as a democracy? Yeah. Well, I mean, that's another issue in itself. When you have these former militants who were then paid off, they were, you know, given millions of pounds or they were given surveillance contracts. And are the ones? One's, trillions of Naira, you were saying. Right. And, you know, they're armed and they have a lot of control. So when it then comes to elections, you have politicians relying on these former militants to provide security, to control voters, politics and militancy, then become intertwined. And you know, that's going to undermine democracy even more. In the past, our elections became extremely violent because you had one government political party collaborating with one set of militants and then you have the opposing political party giving money to a different set of militants. And then those militants were clashing with one another. And so that's the thing with Nigeria is whenever you have some sort of corruption on the ground that started by people at the bottom of the food chain, what you see are people at the top of the food chain, then just getting involved in that rather than trying to eliminate it. And the facts are not democracy as well. Correct me if I'm wrong. So back to the solar power, because you mentioned this a few times, what do you make of Nigerians as a state response to global warming? I don't think you touch upon it in your book, but please correct me if I'm wrong. How would you assess where Nigeria is as a state in terms of responding to not just global warming environmental degradation has been caused by mining and oil and gas, but also just in terms of what else is happening in the world, what we know about the state of earth and trying to reduce carbon emissions, what would you say Nigeria's state policy is? I've never got the sense that there is much of a conversation around that. The Nigerian government is having to constantly fight fires in terms of security issues. You've got this huge problem in the north of Islamic terrorism through Boko Haram. We're containing people in the south just by providing monthly stipends. We have a major cost of living crisis. The government is really just as far as I can see is having to focus on those very sort of immediate issues and global warming then becomes a luxury topic that we can't afford. I mean, even when I have conversations with people down in the Niger Delta and I express concerns about the environment, the response is the ordinary guy on the ground can't afford to think about these things. For them, it's about survival. They're going to refine oil illegally because they have to support their families. And I feel that the federal government in Nigeria is also in a sort of survival mode, you know, of its own making. I could be wrong, maybe someone has spoken about. That's my sense as well. I'm always struck by the fact that when it comes to what's happening in terms of global warming to the environment and we see the floods in Nigeria every couple of a season and it's the same response and there's nothing changes. There is does seem to be a lack of awareness whether it's on the state level whether it's on the citizen, you know, public level, but I just want us to check with you because we do know that we have a Ministry of Environment. We know that we have this ecological fund that's funded, I think, directly from revenue and has almost 400 million dollars. This is allocated between 2020 and 2021 thereabouts, but nobody's ever sure what happens to these funds, you know, whether the money's ever deployed. And I remember when you were saying earlier about the Amnesty Fund, it's the same thing. Like these funds are created, it becomes slush funds for corruption, for stealing elections. There's no accountability. I mean, broadly speaking, federal governments, politicians are just very short-sighted. They don't have a grand vision of what Nigeria should be, could be. They don't really think in those terms. But what about the state governance? So yes, I can agree that maybe the federal government is in Abujan. It's always accused anyway of being remote and removed and not connected to the lives of people, but the state governance. So what would be the governors of bail, south, delta, rivers? Why don't they care if Abuja, if the federal government in Abuja can be short-sighted? What about the state governors who do have at least budgets, do have some control, do have some power? I'm curious. Would you say that reverse state, for example, has a policy on the environment that they attract? Because I'm quite sure that the Commission of Environment, even though I don't know, if you'd give me a million dollars to say, well, that person is, I can't tell you, but I'm sure that reverse state has a Commission of Environment. What about the state? What would you say about the state responsibility to the environment? There's a lot of talk and there are a lot of policies in place, but then the actual action on the ground, there's a big gap between what's said and what the intentions are and then what actually happens. The UN, they conducted a study looking at the extent of the environmental destruction in the Niger Delta and they issued a report, the UN Environmental Program issued a report in 2011, which concluded that all companies were responsible for a huge amount of environmental damage and were obligated to remediate that pollution. And so a billion dollars was put towards the cleanup of the environment and the organisation was set up that the acronym is High Prep. Remember that? Yes, High Prep, yeah. Yeah. And it has done some certain good things. You've seen a cleanup of certain areas of the Niger Delta, but at the same time, there's a lot of talk of corruption, the money not going to where it's supposed to go. And that's just what always seems to happen in Nigeria. You have policies that are made, intentions are stated, that the actual action on the ground is patchy. There's still that corruption and there's still there's a lack of real will and I feel that as time goes on, people become more and more ignorant in terms of understanding the link between environment and farming and even family structures as well. I was struck by how many former militants I spoke to who got involved and these are very sweet, kind, gentle natured men who got involved in this violent militancy back in the 2000s because they were trying to support a huge number of siblings. So many of them told me I'm the eldest of eight children or my father had three wives, but no one seems to understand the connection between that and the pressures on environment and the way people need money and which then leads them to engage in illegal refining or militancy. No one seems to connect the dots at all and I feel that even our politicians don't seem to understand. You can take money, you can steal money from government coffers but ultimately it's going to cost you further down the line, you can enrich yourself for now, but further down the line you're going to have to pay stipends to people because they become frustrated through poverty and turn to violent militancy. You're going to have to pay money to help people when they're afloods and then you're going to have to protect yourself for fear of being kidnapped. So that's just a short sightedness, people are not connecting the dots and you see that at all levels of society. When he's almost like you read the questions that sort of had written down to ask you because I was going to just ask that same question like, do you what do you think about people making the links between the environmental degradation, the capitalism, the corruption, the lack of resource control and sort of tying that to a form of imperialism that you know we see and the conversations about reparations and restitution. I was just wondering are people making this link between all of this and you've just pointed out that I have to say I'm very alarming your diagnosis that people are becoming more ignorant because you'd like to think that with time people are becoming more knowledgeable, you know, aware. So here that people are becoming more ignorant. What would you say is the reason? Is it the poverty? It's poverty, there's the lack of history as well. I didn't know this but apparently history as a subject in schools was removed from school curriculum and you can see the effects of that. When I go to the Niger Delta, people above a certain age know who can thoroughly work is but people below a certain age, especially if they're not well educated, they don't know. I feel the government is on a mission to make people forget their past but it's also a problem that you see in the West as well. Well in the West can't connect the dots either. There's this whole anxiety about immigration example but that is entirely connected to neoliberal capitalism. It's like if you don't want immigrants then you have to especially in countries like England where you've got to do something about this laissez-faire capitalism that is allowed people to accumulate so much property. It's boosted property prices which then affects people's ability to take lower paid jobs. Yeah. It's the immigrants that have to do those jobs. It's like it's all tied up in the system and people, though, seem to realize that. So if a country like England with 99% literacy, if people here can't even connect the dots then. Yeah absolutely right. So I thank you for even broadening this lack of history because yes we do bemoan the fact that in Nigeria we don't take history seriously and I definitely think it's deliberate. It's a relic of imperialist Britain and wanting to train a bunch of people who would really not know their history and just follow and of course the people who took over Nigeria in 1960 just continue that and have still doing it but I'm glad you made that broader link that yeah history is dangerous for every government and every state especially now as things are getting worse for people as we see the unsustainability of neoliberalism in the way that it's been practiced and yeah and that's why America can literally burn books and you know it blows down libraries and that's same thing that's happening in the UK. So yeah right this is a general attack on history and knowledge and it makes sense as you said it's not just Nigerians who are becoming more ignorance but people live in a broad the sort older and light and west are becoming even more ignorant of how the world works and they're rolling in it. I just want to try and leave a little time for a few lighter things but one more question I really I was struck by and of course I didn't say that I'm Nigerian but hopefully it's come out in the conversation that I am. You mentioned it way through the Ejo got of justice and truth who has very strict ethics for war and I was really taken by that because I was like oh this sounds really fascinating would you say a bit more about that and do you think that Iqbe Su and those who believe in Iqbe Su doesn't guide them in any way is this something that if revived in some way more people knew about speaking about knowledge and awareness and ignorance would this help the Niger Delta in any way would it help Nigeria if more people understood this Ejo got of justice and truth. Yeah I don't know I mean yes the Iqbe Su it's this sort of you know it's an Ejo god belief system and a lot of the militant who were from the Ejo ethnic group subscribed to this belief system and you've got people like Tom Polo who's a chief sort of former militant very influential man who is a priest of that religion and you know he takes it very seriously and he's revered for that reason and so yeah Iqbe Su has a code of conduct when it comes to war but like with any religion it's great on paper but people that necessarily practice it as it should be practiced but yeah I was struck by how many former militants I spoke to who really believe in this system but there's a lot of supernatural stuff there's a belief that if you you follow certain rituals you will be impervious to bullets. People can shoot you and do anything and you still won't die. I remind me of a story. I'm sorry, this is an anecdote of a party one time fella had this trauma who would say claim that he'd giving him invincibility towards bullets. He was now free of being able to be killed or shot and he wanted to test it out and his brother, I think, either beco, I think that's something that was like, let's trade on this goods first before we trade. You know, it was the good date. But when you said that, I remember that anecdote. But please, go inside. I mean, there's what people believe. And I mean, I think it's the West. When you look at England, they were very good at taking religion and fusing it into that sort of capitalist belief or whatever. If they have an agenda that they needed in order to take the country in a certain direction or take society in a certain direction, they used religion in order to make that happen, which is, you know, it's sneaky, but it's effective. To give an example, I'm curious. Do the same examples come to mind of how Lisbon was used in aid of capitalism? I'm like the Protestant World Catholic, for example. Sure. It's really just a way of getting low pay people at the bottom and to work in those mills, use the textiles, produce the coal, you know, you're sort of made to feel that you're lazy and somehow sort of going against God. I mean, God, yeah, not so, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That's work ethic. But I kind of wish that in Nigeria, we would find a way to take our indigenous beliefs of systems, which are still. Which is why. That's because I was very taken by the idea of an igwe su and I was like, oh, yeah, why can't you build on that exactly, but you know, you need to sort of blend it with solar power and things like that. But you know, how you do that? I don't know. I hope you're setting up a solar power company because you're really into solar power now. You've mentioned solar power, like it's one common thread. But right now, Nigeria is going through really major energy crisis and there's so many memes about having solar power. You know, it's like, it's now like, if you do house solar power, like really, honestly, are you, you know, are you human? Are you, do you have money? Are you sensible? Because there's no electricity, there's no power and it's very hot right now before the rainy season. So everybody is talking about solar power actually. Yeah. And a lot of people have it, you know, when you go to the homes of people who are a little bit more well to do and you see that and when you're in Nigeria, but you're constantly passing Chinese engineers and they're here to install solar power. So it is something that we are pivoting to, but it's not happening on a fast or broad enough scale. And the president that probably told us that if he didn't fix power in two years, three years, we should hold him responsible. Apparently, has made as we rock the home of power fully of the grid. It's now powered by by solar. But let me ask you, did you learn anything new and surprising? I bet you did, but anything that sticks out from researching this book, writing this book, what one or two things that you found that you didn't know that really struck you as important. Well, I mean, as I mentioned before, I was just shocked at the extent to which the economy within the Niger Delta depends on illegal oil refining. I mean, you've got like radio stations, radio programs talking about this problem, but the radio station itself is powered by illegal oil. I didn't realize that the extent of it. I thought it was just the common man and woman needing paraffin and kerosene, most sorts of things. So the extent of it was just absolutely massive. But I also, I spoke to a lot of women activists. There's a whole kind of gender aspect to this. And the women are doing fantastic things. They are, a lot of them are farmers. You know, male farmers too, but women are the ones really holding things together. They are the farmers. But the problem is when you have an oil spill or you have flooding, the compensation is then often given to the men. And so I think women have a much more closer relationship with nature. You know, they really sort of, they can connect the dots. Whereas the men are a bit more concerned about income. They just want income. If that income comes with expensive environments, it should be it. And it's the women who just, you know, who have to bear the brunt of that. So there's a whole sort of female aspect to this. And I spoke to some women in this report. And you know, that was something that was, they're really sort of, for me, emphasised that the importance of valuing women as well. And I think a lot of people, they just want to fall asleep or roll their eyes when you talk about feminism and women's rights. But again, they're not connecting the dots. If you give women rights, then it's their children, their sons, who benefit as well. And so that's really important. But I also, you know, visited different parts of the Delta, especially in the last two years. I visited a conservation project, one by the South West's Nigelta project. And they protected a few hectares of forest. They still have Colours as monkeys and all these incredible species. They convinced the local population to stop eating bush meat, it's repeated as a resource that is a value when kept alive. It's fabulous, you know. And it's still, there are still parts of the Delta that are absolutely beautiful. And we can reclaim that beauty and make money from it. Oil is a very capital intensive industry. It doesn't help loads, loads of people. You know, you pick capital dividends from this. It's tiny. You can make a lot more money by maintaining a healthy agricultural system. And tourism ultimately doesn't have to be like this. Yeah, sadly. Are you working on anything next? And if yes, you don't have to divulge too much. But what themes are you looking at? Just ideas that you're grappling with. It doesn't have to be other than neither do I think it could be anything in the world. Yeah, well, I mean, obviously, for me and for a lot of people, we understand that at the moment, the world, especially the Western world is concerned about immigration, all of these things. It's all about foreign cultures. But really, we all know that it's a class problem. And it's the ruling classes around the world that are sowing division between the people at the bottom and pretending that the problems that we have can be solved by just getting, by removing foreigners. And so it's just that classic problem of class versus race is that that's on my mind and features in what will hopefully be my next photo. Thank you for that. And the last last one, I know I've said last one more than once. But are you reading anything interesting that you recommend? Or have you read anything leading that you recommend? I haven't read much, but you know, the open foundations, you know, your book, the over the anthology of our, the ideas letter anthology that we publish. Yes, that anthology. So I've received that a couple of months ago. And it was my intention to read one story every day. You know, I haven't quite followed through on that. Life's too hectic. But that's a great book. Yeah, I'm looking forward to finishing that one. Fantastic. So thank you so much. You really appreciate your time. I hope this was as useful for you as it has been for me and hopefully for our listeners. Absolutely. No, thank you so much for having me. I appreciate it. All right. Take care. Take care.