Nigeria’s trade grows by 49% in Q2, as deficit drops

China, India emerge dominant partners as intra-African trade remains low
Boilers, machinery, appliances dominate import

Despite the lull witnessed in the economy in the second quarter of the year, the total value of Nigeria’s merchandise trade in Q2, 2016 stood at ₦3.94 trillion, 49 per cent more than the value of ₦2.64 trillion recorded in the preceding quarter.

Indeed, while there are clamours for the country to increase trade among member-countries in the continent, latest figures from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) show that China and India emerge dominant trade partners during the period in terms of imports and exports within the period.
Furthermore, Nigeria exported goods valued at ₦265.9 billion or 14.2 per cent to the continent of Africa while export to the ECOWAS region totalled ₦86.9 billion

The NBS attributed the rise in the value of the nation’s merchandise to a rise of ₦725.6 billion or 63.3 per cent, in the value of exports (largely due to exchange rate gains) combined with a rise of ₦570.8 billion or 38.1 per cent, in the value of imports against the levels recorded in the preceding quarter.

The current trade position brought the country’s negative trade balance to negative ₦196.5 billion during the period under review, showing a ₦154.8 billion reduction in the country’s trade deficit over the previous quarter.

Specifically, Nigeria’s import trade stood at ₦2.06 trillion at the end of Q2, 2016, showing an increase of 38.1 per cent from the value ₦1.49 trillion recorded in the preceding quarter.

As with exports, the NBS noted that the increase in import value can be traced to a decline in the value of the naira.

A breakdown of the structure of Nigeria’s import trade by section, showed that trade was dominated by the imports of “Boilers, machinery and appliances; parts thereof” which accounted for 34.9 per cent of the total value of import trade in Q2, 2016.

“Other commodities which contributed noticeably to the value of import trade during the review period were “Mineral products” (15.8 per cent), “Vehicles, aircraft and parts thereof; vessels etc.”(14.7 per cent), “Products of the chemical and allied industries” (7.6 per cent) and “Base metals and articles of base metals” (5.1 per cent).

“The import trade classified by broad economic category (Table 7) revealed that “capital goods and parts” ranked first with ₦663.6billion or 32.1 per cent. This was followed by “Industrial supplies (nec)” with the value of ₦421.2billion or 20.4 per cent, and “Transport Equipment and Parts” with ₦356.1billion or 17.2 per cent.

“The value of motor spirit stood at ₦296.1 billion. Nigeria’s import trade by direction showed that the Country imported goods mostly from China, Netherlands, United States, India and the United Kingdom, which respectively accounted for ₦493.5 billion or 23.9 per cent, ₦285.7 billion or 13.8 per cent, ₦199.0 billion or 9.6 per cent, ₦124.9 billion or 6.0 per cent, and ₦119.3 billion or 5.8 per cent of the total value of goods imported during the quarter”, the NBS stated.

Further analysis of Nigeria’s imports by Continent revealed that the country consumed goods largely from Asia with import value of ₦886.1 billion or 42.8 per cent.

The Country also imported goods valued at ₦813.9 billion or 39.3 per cent from Europe and ₦255.3 billion or 12.3 per cent from America. Import trade from Africa stood at ₦89.1 billion or 4.3 per cent while imports from the region of ECOWAS amounted to ₦20.8 billion.

Also, the value of the export trade, totalled ₦1.87 trillion in Q2, 2016 showing an increase of ₦725.6 billion or 63.3 per cent, over the value recorded in the preceding quarter.