Boost for air cargo as Nahco commences export of food items

Nahco Aviance, West Africa’s ground handling service provider, recorded a milestone recently as it started the exportation of food items to Europe under its new subsidiary, NAHCO Food and Beverages Limited.

It commenced the exportation of fresh pepper after being certified by the Nigeria Agricultural Quarantine Service (NAQS) and after consultation with foreign food standards agencies.

The initiative has been touted by analysts as one that would revolutionalise the way Nigeria’s produce is packaged for foreign markets.

This feat is the first by any major operator at the airport and comes on the back of an aggressive push by the federal government for increased export of Nigerian products.

The new export business by the Company is in conjunction with its appointed partners to export the first batch of the exports consisting of high-grade fresh Nigerian pepper.

Indranil Gupta, the group managing director/CEO, of Nahco Aviance, said this development was coming at a time when quite a number of stakeholders had identified packaging as a major challenge for Nigerian exports.

Gupta added that the company is doing a lot to assist local producers of agric products in realizing their dreams of exporting quality commodities to markets in Europe, America and Asia.

“We appreciate the hard work some of our farmers put into producing their goods. NAHCO is trying to support them export these products so as to make these efforts more worthwhile for them. It is also a way of generating scarce foreign exchange for the country,” Gupta said.

Explaining the process which led to the commencement of the food exports, Emmanuel Illah, the senior business development manager, of the new business, Nahco Aviance, pointed out that the project is part of NAHCO’s larger expansion strategy driven by three major objectives: Growth, Risk Reduction and Profitability.

According to Illah, the GMD/CEO of the Company, Indranil Gupta, drove the initiative and has provided support and technical know-how so far.

Disclosing plans by the Company to onboard new consignees/off-takers Illah added, “The marketing campaign and planned roadshow will take care of this. We plan to expand the product range substantially in due course to accommodate the requests from the diaspora markets.”

Ifeoma Okeke-Korieocha

Ifeoma Okeke-Korieocha is the Aviation Correspondent at BusinessDay Media Limited, publishers of BusinessDay Newspapers. She is also the Deputy Editor, BusinessDay Weekender Magazine, the Saturday Weekend edition of BusinessDay. She holds a BSC in Mass Communication from the prestigious University of Nigeria, Nsukka and a Masters degree in Marketing at the University of Lagos. As the lead writer on the aviation desk, Ifeoma is responsible and in charge of the three weekly aviation and travel pages in BusinessDay and BDSunday. She also overseas and edits all pages of BusinessDay Saturday Weekender. She has written various investigative, features and news stories in aviation and business related issues and has been severally nominated for award in the category of Aviation Writer of the Year by the Nigeria Media Nite-Out awards; one of the Nigeria’s most prestigious media awards ceremonies. Ifeoma is a one-time winner of the prestigious Nigeria Media Merit Award under the 'Aviation Writer of the Year' Category. She is the 2025 Eloy Award winner under the Print Media Journalist category. She has undergone several journalism trainings by various prestigious organisations. Ifeoma is also a fellow of the Female Reporters Leadership Fellowship of the Wole Soyinka Centre for Investigative Journalism.