The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has slashed the exchange rate for calculating import duty at the nation’s seaport by 1.9% owing to a slight appreciation of the naira against the United States dollar at the weekend.
Data obtained from the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) online trade portal, shows that the exchange rate for import duty calculation was reduced to N1,500.837/$ from N1,530/$ used on Friday, May 17.
Read also: Customs import duty exchange rate hits N1,502 on naira depreciation
This equals a 1.9% reduction compared to the old rate of N1,530/$ used for the opening of Form M last week, and a decrease of N29.163 on a dollar needed to clear goods at the port.
With the slash in the exchange rate, importers opening Form M today (Monday) will have some measures of relief in terms of the money required to pay import duties compared to the importer who opened Form M last week.
Despite the slash in rate, the adjustment has further exemplified the volatile nature of the naira which has become very worrisome to importers and manufacturers.
They believe that exchange rate stability helps businesses to plan their investments.
The naira appreciated by 2.45% and traded for N1,497.33 against the dollar on Friday compared to N1,533.99 per dollar exchanged on Thursday at the Nigerian Autonomous Foreign Exchange Market (NAFEM).
BusinessDay report predicted that the naira will likely witness further depreciation despite a rise in the external reserves.
Nigeria’s external reserves rose by 0.69% to $32.642 billion as of May 16, 2024, from $32.418 billion in May 9, 2024 data from the CBN indicated.
Also, dollars supplied by willing sellers and willing buyers declined by 63%, week-on-week to a total of $991.90 million last week from $608.50 million recorded the previous week.
