By Doris Obinna
The challenges hitherto experienced by Importers and exporters at the nation’s ports and borders may soon become a thing of the past as the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) and the Global Alliance for Trade Facilitation (GATF) have commenced putting together strategies aimed at achieving standardization and harmonization of documents for export and import trade.
In a statement by NAFDAC Resident Media Consultant, Sayo Akintola on Sunday, the Director General of NAFDAC, Prof. Mojisola Adeyeye, who stated this at a virtual meeting with the Global Alliance for Trade Facilitation, Nigeria top officials led by its Project Lead, Mr. Bernard Traynor, said the view was to simplify trade formalities and procedures and ultimately ensuring ease of doing business in Nigeria.
According to her, the project is being powered by the Global Alliance for Trade Facilitation. “It’s an organization that is being hosted by the Centre for International Private Enterprise, International Chambers of Commerce, and the World Economic Forum.
“The project in Nigeria is being implemented by the German Technical Cooperation popularly known as GIZ. The alliance is supported by the governments of US, Canada, Germany, Denmark and government of Australia through their respective agencies.”
Adeyeye who was represented by Dr Abimbola Adegboye, Head of Trade and International Relations at the Agency reiterated measures that NAFDAC has already put in place to ensure that there’s a seamless and more robust operational procedure with both export and import at the borders; and achieve cooperation amongst government agencies at the borders.
She said: “NAFDAC’s focus now is to ensure smooth trade facilitation and regulation. The operations of regulators should not pose an hinderance to trade transactions but facilitate them.
’’We are focused on making sure that there are not so many interferences between the users of our facilities and ourselves. So, we try as much as possible to remove both human interferences under the guise of consultants. Because more or less they do not facilitate trade. They tend to distort it.”
“Trade should be on basis of safety and quality, noting that, that is the only way trade could be sustained. ‘’If quality is not put into your product, It gives the country a bad name. They blacklist the company involved. The consumers are the losers because they do not have value for money and their health is compromised,” she added.
She noted that these are the issues that the global alliance is trying to address, adding that ‘’what will make all these visible and possible is to ensure that operations at the borders are seamless.”
On his part, the Project Manager of Global Alliance for Trade Facilitation, Nigeria, Mr. David Okeku, said the title for the project is Standardization and Harmonization of Trade formalities and procedures in Nigeria. He disclosed that his organization is being powered by the Centre for International Private Enterprise, International Chambers of Commerce, and the World Economic Forum.
He further explained that the project in Nigeria is being implemented by the German Technical Cooperation popularly known as GIZ and supported by the governments of US, Canada, Germany, Denmark and government of Australia through their respective agencies.
‘’Being an alliance, we also have critical private sector partners,. which we work with: BLM, BSM, DHL, Mascline, UPS and WALMART. On a global scale, we have series of projects which we are currently implementing in Kenya, Madagascar, Malawi, Zambia, Senegal, Uganda and Latin America, Asia and middle East countries.”