Nigeria losing forex through rejected food exports

Nigeria losing forex through poor trade facilitation for export items

By Jeph Ajobaju, Chief Copy Editor

Up to 70 per cent of food exports from Nigeria are being rejected overseas, according to the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC), which blames the situation on poor trade facilitation for regulated export items.

NAFDAC Director General Mojisola Adeyeye, a Professor, lamented the loss at the commissioning of a new NAFDAC office complex at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport/NAHCO in Lagos.

She  said the incidence is a cause for concern for NAFDAC, as it means huge financial losses to exporters and the country in general.

She enthused, however, the rejection of food exports from Nigeria in some European Union (EU) countries and the United States will end if collaboration between NAFDAC and other government agencies at the ports is strengthened.

Adeyeye disclosed NAFDAC is initiating collaboration with other government agencies at the ports to ensure export goods are of requisite quality and meet the regulations of importing countries before shipment.

Her words: “This raises the need for more enhanced export regulation – packaging, pre-shipment testing and certification to provide some quality assurance and minimise rejects.

“To save our national reputation in international commerce, all stakeholders in the export trade should see this as a call to duty and collaborate with NAFDAC for the sake of the country and our collective future.

“The mandate to safeguard the health of the populace through ensuring that food, medicines, cosmetics, medical devices, chemicals, and packaged water are safe, efficacious and of the right quality in an economy that is overwhelmingly dependent on the importation of the bulk of its finished products and raw materials could never have been actualised without the effective presence of NAFDAC at the ports and land borders.”

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Benefits of inter-agency collaboration

“Our push through the resilience of the past Director, Prof Samson Adebayo, on assumption of duty, for the immediate return of NAFDAC to the ports that eventually happened in May 2018 …. With gratitude for the approval of the President and the various arms of the government, the results of our presence at the ports are available for everyone to see,” Adeyeye added, per Vanguard.

Adeyeye commended the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) for its relationship with NAFDAC, saying, “without customs, they will not be able to do a lot of what they have been able to do.

“NAFDAC collaborates with Nigeria Agricultural Quarantine Services to ensure that due diligence is done because over 70 per cent of the products that leave our ports get rejected. Considering the money spent on getting those products out of the country, it is a double loss for both the exporter and the country.

“Without the police, we cannot do much in terms of investigation and enforcement. We have over 80 policemen with us in NAFDAC. They help us a lot when we are doing raids or investigations as the case may be.”

She disclosed NAFDAC is optimising and customising its processes, and the Ports Inspection Data-Capture and Risk Management System (PIDCARMS) is deployed in all ports and land borders to automatically capture and process imported regulated products data from the Nigeria Customs Information System (NICIS).