• Strategises on agency’s return to ports

The Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON) has issued a July 30 deadline for the shutdown of Electronic Product Certificate (EPC) platform to address issues of quality and influx of sub-standard goods in the country.

According to the agency, the move is to check the quality of goods being imported as well as ensure that importers conform to standardisation requirements for such goods.

Besides, the Federal Government has said efforts are ongoing to address issues of SON’s return to the ports, adding that stakeholders are reviewing frameworks to make it a reality.

Indeed, the SON had last year, partnered with the Central Bank of Nigeria, and the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) to commence an online data sharing initiative to check the influx of such goods in the country.

The move, which would be implemented through SON’s e-certificate platform, would see the agencies collaborating and integrating SON’s e-certificate into the Nigeria Integrated Customs Information System (NICIS).

Under the arrangement, SON’s e-product certificate and SONCAP certificate will now be tied to the relevant processes for the generation of form M and generation of PAAR for clearance of goods at the port.

In a chat with journalists after a tour of SON’s facilities in Lagos by the Minister of State for Industry, Trade and Investment, Mrs Aisha Abubakar, Acting Director-General of SON, Dr. Paul Angya said the agency is fast-tracking the development of its infrastructure to aid export of commodities to the global market.

He explained that obtaining certificates to show that certain goods have being approved by the Standards Organisation of Nigeria and other regulatory enforcement agencies in Nigeria is apt in the nation’s quest to address influx of substandard goods.

Already, stakeholders have decried influx of sub-standard goods through certification platforms noting that most of the problems with imports in the country are related to documents that cannot be traced to their sources.

Minister of State for Industry, Trade and Investment, Mrs Aisha Abubakar noted that the Federal Government is reviewing modalities to enhance the capacity of SON to deliver its mandate.

She added that government is also working on implementing the procurement law to boost patronage of locally produced goods in the country.

On the return of SON to the ports, Angya had told The Guardian that the decision to order SON out of the ports may have been informed by the circumstances of that time, due to so many agencies at the ports, saying that if they expel most of those agencies at the port it will facilitate ease of doing business at the ports and at that time issues of quality as not on top priority of that government and so it made that order and SON was expelled.

“It may have been well reasoned at that time, but in this present time, when that decision is still being implemented, when the country is being overrun by fake and substandard products, when all local industries are closing up, apart from food products, very little of manufacturing processes is being done in Nigeria because of the availability of cheaper products from off shore and unfortunately these cheaper products do not deliver on the quality. More than 90 per cent of these products are not reasonably fit for the purpose for which they are manufactured.

“I will tell you that the argument is no longer germane because right now, everything is digital at the ports. So, nobody needs to write a signature anywhere. The customs do not physically inspect the goods, it is only regulatory agencies like us that can physically inspect goods because once you load the goods from the point of order, you are tracked online, the amount of the goods on the ship, the cost of the goods and the tariffs mathematically are worked out by the computer and the demand notice is delivered to your address where you will also pay online and by the time the goods arrive, you do not have to go to the ports because they are delivered to your premises. So, it is only issues of quality, when the quality institutions suspect that these products are not meeting with quality they intercept and examine”, he added.