Nigeria must reduce costs to enjoy AFCFTA – NPA

The Nigerian Ports Authority has said that for Nigeria to benefit fully from the $3.4tn African Continental Free Trade Agreement, the country needs to reduce the local cost of doing business.

The Managing Director of NPA, Mohammed Bello-koko, in an exclusive interview with The PUNCH in Lagos, said that the country must put in place measures that would ensure the standardisation and quality checks of cargoes. According to him, Nigeria needs to improve its Customs processes by updating its e-custom and Customs services. “About 55 African countries are involved in this. Our own responsibility is to ensure trade facilitation. So, for Nigeria to gain in this, we need to ensure there are standardisation and quality checks of cargoes. Nigeria needs to improve its Customs processes. We need to update our e-custom and Customs services. We need to reduce the local cost of doing business. We need to reduce the bureaucracy and then there must also be awareness,” he stated. The NPA boss added that Nigeria should take comparative advantage of what each country was going to do, stressing that until all the issues were addressed, Nigeria might end up as a dumping ground for other African countries.

He, however, commended the government for its efforts in sensitising Nigerians to the benefits of AFCFTA.

“A lot of efforts by the government are commendable. Sensitisation is taking place but I think we need to do more. All the agencies of government are involved in trade facilitation, whether it is Customs,

NPA, aviation, and so on.

“For us in NPA, what we have done is that we have set up export processing terminals. The essence is to improve the quality of exports, especially agro exports. It is a one-stop shop, where an exporter brings his cargo, it is sorted, tested, branded, packaged, sealed in a container and send directly to the port. This reduces time wastages and the incidences of some of our agro cargoes going out of the country and arriving at the port of destination spoilt. So, we are working with the NCS to ensure that these things improve. We are working with National Export Promotion Council to ensure that the domestic export houses are linked to the Electronic Call-up System in such a way that whatever is coming in from the hinterland gets into the port easily and as quickly as possible,” he explained.