‘Supporting greater trade within Africa, global community is vital to CBN’s objectives’
21 April 2021 |
4:00 am
The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has stated that supporting greater trade within Africa and the global community is vital to its objectives of enabling greater economic growth and creating employment opportunities for the country’s growing population CBN Governor, Godwin Emefiele, stated this during a presentation at Zenith Bank’s 2021 Export Seminar, which held…
CBN
The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has stated that supporting greater trade within Africa and the global community is vital to its objectives of enabling greater economic growth and creating employment opportunities for the country’s growing population
CBN Governor, Godwin Emefiele, stated this during a presentation at Zenith Bank’s 2021 Export Seminar, which held via a virtual platform yesterday,
He assured exporters that they would continue to have unfettered access to their export proceeds, while urging them to reciprocate the good gestures of the central bank by repatriating their funds.
He said the COVID-19 pandemic and its resulting implications on crude oil prices in 2020, which led to a significant decline in government revenues and forex earnings, had strengthened the case for the diversification of the economy.
Emefiele expressed optimism that the African Continental Free Trade Agreement (AFCFTA) offers opportunities for the Nigerian private sector to expand into new markets and seek new export opportunities, particularly in the area of manufacturing, ICT, agriculture and financial services.
According to him, the full implementation of AFCFTA would give Nigerian firms preferential access to markets in Africa worth $504.17 billion in goods and $162 billion in services.
He said: “I believe that we should seize this opportunity to ensure that Nigeria serve as a significant hub for international and domestic manufacturing companies seeking to serve the West, Central and East African markets.
“In addition, we have a very young energetic and technological savvy population that has been leveraging technological applications to improve service delivery in the areas of finance, logistics and agriculture to consumers in Nigeria.
I believe the AFCFTA will provide an opportunity for these young talented Nigerians to expand their services across the African region. Developing trade portals that could support instant sales of goods manufactured in Nigeria to consumers in other parts of Africa is one aspect that can help to support the creation of jobs in Nigeria and improve foreign exchange inflows for the country.”
He said Nigerian banks were expanding across Africa, just as he encouraged financial institutions to also leverage their presence in other parts of Africa to support Nigerian businesses seeking to expand into new markets in Africa by providing trade facilities to those with strong potentials for growth
He said: “At the CBN, we have taken considerable steps to improve the productive capacity of businesses, which would enable them to take advantage of export opportunities in Africa.
“Our intervention programmes in the agriculture and manufacturing sectors are helping to enable businesses to expand their scale of production, which is meeting growing domestic demand for goods, but also providing goods for the export market.
In addition, we have set up a N500 billion non-oil export stimulation facility with the Nigerian Export-Import Bank (NEXIM). This initiative will also help to enable greater exports of processed agriculture commodities into other markets in Africa and in the global market.”
Emefiele, however, added that improving the business environment in Nigeria would be vital if the country was to harness the gains from AFCFTA.
According to him, the CBN, through its Trade Monitoring System portal (TRMS), has been helping to reduce the time it takes to complete the export documentation process, as the faster turnaround time could help to reduce delivery time for goods destined for exports and enable businesses to expand their output.
“Today, businesses can complete their NXP applications on the TRMS portal in 30 minutes relative to two years ago, where it could take as much as two weeks to complete the process,” he said.
Related
8 hours ago
The Managing Director of Nigeria Breweries Plc, Hans Essaadi, said the fact that the naira has shown some appreciation against the dollar in recent weeks has had little or no impact on input cost.
8 hours ago
The Ooni of Ife, Oba Adeyeye Enitan Ogunwusi, Ojaja II, said the recently-launched Tingo Cola and Tingo Electric energy drink would not only deepen local content principles and compete locally with other exportable brands but would also provide employment to hundreds of youths in the country.
8 hours ago
Despite the abundance of raw materials needed for self-sufficiency and the production of pulp and paper in the country, Nigeria is still missing out on the massive income to be made on the production, sale and export valued at $360 billion.
8 hours ago
The Chartered Institute of Taxation of Nigeria (CITN) has warned political leaders against abuse of taxpayers' money, stating that collecting tax revenue from taxpayers without using it judiciously weakens the country's taxation system.
8 hours ago
To halt the fresh panic building over the fate of the naira, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) is set to disburse another tranche of liquidity intervention to 1,583 Bureau de Change operators.
8 hours ago
Oil-producing communities in Niger Delta have called for transparency and accountability in the ongoing divestment of oil and gas assets in the region.
8 hours ago
The Nasarawa State government said it is leveraging industrial, agricultural and mining potential for inclusive and sustainable wealth creation in a bid to drive its industrialisation agenda and position the state as an economic hub.
8 hours ago
With a headline inflation rate of 33.2 per cent and food inflation of 40.01 per cent, chiefly blamed on the high cost of transportation, which has continued to rise, it might take a while for respite to come.
8 hours ago
Following the recent appointment of new management and board for the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), shareholders have stressed the need for the members to accelerate the development of the capital market by improving the response time to complaints and monitoring listed firms' compliance with extant rules.
1 day ago
The price of Liquefied Petroleum Gas (LPG), also known as cooking gas, has continued its upward swing rising by 7.1 per cent in the last month, thus making life more difficult for Nigerians who are struggling with food inflation.
×
Get the latest news delivered straight to your inbox every day of the week. Stay informed with the Guardian’s leading coverage of Nigerian and world news, business, technology and sports.
0 Comments
We will review and take appropriate action.