Export or Die…

•More than ever, the Export Council, NAFDAC, SON and other stakeholders must get serious about export

One would think that Nigeria needs no diviner to convince her that she must diversify her economy hastily if she would not lapse into a failed state in a couple of years. Again, one would want to take it for granted that methodical and aggressive export stimulation is sine qua non to the country’s very survival and that this ought to be apparent to government and her agencies.

But facts abound to prove that government and most of her agencies seem utterly inured to the reality of a looming economic debacle in Nigeria. They seem particularly lax about the urgent necessity to seek alternative revenues and diversify the economy from dependence on crude oil sales. Thus, stimulating increased export of primary commodities to earn foreign exchange ought to have been a natural alternative.

But this is not the case as recent events show. First, the immediate past managing director of the Nigerian Ports Authority, (NPA) Mr. Habib Abdullahi, in reviewing the activities of the authority for 2015 noted that 90 per cent of containers bringing goods to Nigeria from other countries return empty, among other woeful reports.

Nigeria is probably the only country with this glaring aberrant situation. According to experts, most other countries of Africa have substantial non-oil export commodities to fill out-bound containers. African countries like Cote D’Ivoire, Ghana, Kenya, Malawi and South Africa always have various semi-processed agric products as well as finished goods to export.

Another pointer to Nigeria’s authorities’ lack of seriousness and will to drive her export business is the troubling report about European Union’s (EU) ban on Nigeria’s beans and some other agricultural produce. According to the report, EU Food Safety Authority had in June 2015 suspended the importation of Nigeria’s beans for one year, to allow the relevant Nigerian authorities address some quality control issues.

Beans of Nigeria origin was found to contain between 0.03 mg to 4.6 mg of pesticide considered to be injurious to human health; as opposed to the acceptable maximum residue limit of 0.01 mg per kilogramme.

For one year, the Nigerian authorities could not muster the will to meet the EU condition until the grace period elapsed last June. Now the EU has extended the ban by a punitive three years, depriving Nigerian beans farmers of a lucrative export business reportedly worth about $10 billion.

Notably, agencies such as Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON); National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control, (NAFDAC); Nigerian Export Promotion Council, (NEPC) and the Federal Ministry of Industry, Trade and Investment reportedly collaborated to ensure that the ban was lifted but to no avail.

Just recently, shipping companies raised cargo-handling charges astronomically, thus compounding the woes of exporters. Though the shipping companies complain of scarcity of foreign exchange which warranted their sourcing from the parallel market, exporters insist the new charges are arbitrary and unfair. Ironically, in spite of the government’s sing-song about economic diversification, exporters bemoan official aloofness on this matter.

Yet another telling example of official nonchalance and insensitivity: last week, a large government crew made up of five ministers and a retinue of aides were on a trip termed ‘Nigeria’s investment road show in London’ ostensibly to promote Nigeria’s trade and investment. We dare say that we assumed the days of mindless jamborees like the London show were over with the last government.

This government is still stuck in the old mode of much talk and much show and little work. As we have said so often, this government must return to the basics as far as exports and indeed the economy are concerned.

Nigeria has huge potential in agro-commodity exports and this must be aggressively pursued. Agencies involved must be stirred from slumber and perhaps, rudely too! Our new mantra should be: “Export or die.”