Abuja multibillion naira commodity trading platform rots in Kano

Multibillion naira trading platform of the Abuja Security and Commodity Exchange (ASCE) situated in Kano has continued to rust away as a result of the near collapse of the Exchange.

The trading platform is the core operational window of ASCE that provides interface for dealers in agricultural commodities, such as producers and buyers, to carry out transactions.

A check on Monday indicates that the platform, which became operational in July 2006 under the leadership of Yusuf Abdurrahman, immediate past managing director, has been on the verge of total closure in the past two years.

Although the staff of the Exchange attached to the outfit housed within the multi billion trading facilities mounted to facilitate operations are still reporting for work daily, but the platform is not functioning.

As of the time of filing this report, electricity supply to the facility has been cut off by the Kano Electricity Distribution Company due to inability of the Exchange to settle accumulated bill consumed, which runs into several millions of naira.

It would be recalled that the White Paper of Odife report gave birth to the Abuja stock exchange, but pressure from some quarters that the nation should not have two exchanges gave way to the establishment of the Commodity Exchange from the initial Abuja Stock Exchange.

According to experts, globally, commodities exchanges are owned by trading members and usually organised to facilitate transactions between buyers and sellers of various commodities.

They believe that the involvement of the Federal Government in the running of the operations of ASCE is responsible for some of the inefficiency associated with it existence.

The decision to establish the trading floor in Kano was informed by the strategic position of the state as the hub of agricultural commodities production in West Africa.

Before now, the exchange, which engages in spot trading of six commodities including soya beans, maize, sorghum, cowpea, sesame seed and millet, was on the verge of developing a forward and warehouse receipt activities and futures trading.

The approval for the take-off of the Exchange was granted by the administration of former President Olusegun Obasanjo to relocate the ASCE spot trading operations to Kano because the city is one of the largest producers of grains in the country.

There have been series of efforts in the past to privatised the Exchange, but the move is strongly opposed by a section of stakeholders in the northern part of the country, on the ground that such as move would be injurious to most of the farmers in the region.

The non-functionality of the Exchange has provided opportunity for privately owned foreign commodity trading companies to have monopoly on Nigerian agricultural commodity market.