Adewale Adeniyi, comptroller general of Nigeria Customs Service (NCS), said the service is committed to facilitating trade leveraging policies like the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) and the US government-backed African Growth Opportunity Act (AGOA).
Speaking in Lagos at the Science of Trade (SOT) Conference organised by Ascend Studios Foundation in partnership with the US Consulate and other groups, Adeniyi who was represented by Babatunde Olomu, Customs Area Controller for Apapa Port, said the NCS is setting the process of perfecting trade procedures within the Customs zone.
According to him, Nigeria Customs is collaborating with the Directorate General Taxation and Customs Union of the European Union (EU) to drive efficient export monitoring and trade facilitation.
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He said the service is also working with other government agencies to maximise the opportunities in trade and reduce the incidence of Nigerian goods being returned from countries of destination.
For traders willing to participate in AGOA, the CGC disclosed that efforts are establishing a one-stop-shop export seat for export documentation that will reduce the time Nigerian exporters spend getting their goods out of our port.
He said programmes like the Time Release Studies, targeted at reducing the time it takes businesses to clear their goods in the port, would enhance Customs efficiency in Nigeria in line with global best practices.
The exercise, according to him, will have a scientific measure of how long and how much it costs businesses to export their products through NCS control.
He said it also identifies bureaucratic procedures or laws that are creating delays to enable compliant traders to get their cargo off the ports, border stations, and airports in good time.
He also listed continuous training and retraining of different cadres of customs officers, regular interface with various stakeholders, and sustained improvement on technological capacity as part of efforts embarked upon since his assumption of office.
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Participating as a panellist during an interactive session, Olomu gave a detailed analysis of the trade facilitation benefits of the NCS Act 2023 and the ease of doing business advantages captured in the new Customs law.
He urged Nigeria’s trading community to keep abreast with the provisions of government import and export prohibition lists.
