Forex Regulation Forcing Exporters To Cut Corners - Obiora Madu

Harboursandport.com: Lagos - Federal Government’s foreign exchange, forex, the policy is forcing Nigerian exporters to cut corners, the Chief Executive Officer of Multimix Export Academy, Obiora Madu has said.

Speaking at the public presentation of the Nigerian Logistics And Supply Chain Industry Report, NLASCIR for 2021, Madu said that different government agencies' issuance of the conflicting directives on forex repatriation is not friendly to exporters some of who are forced to keep their earnings abroad.

The Multimix boss while one agency is saying exporters can hold on to their forex, another agency says they must sell at a given price. He noted that some of them are forced to open bank accounts abroad where they keep their earnings.

According to him, “Because we have oil in Nigeria we are not paying attention to export yet. The environment is not friendly but the exporters are still struggling in exporting.

“One major problem is policies inconsistency because one government says every exporter have access to their foreign exchange then someone else says 100 per cent of their foreign exchange is under control and they must sell at a certain rate.

“Another one is national integrity; that is another problem because everybody is afraid of Nigerians, which is affecting export because you are not getting the kind of market you want, your goods are going on discounted in prices.

"They are forced to open domiciliary accounts outside Nigeria, once the goods come in they find a way to let the goods go out illegally because if you do from Nigerian ports; they must repatriate but if you do not export through Nigerian ports then the money is theirs, and this encourages corruption," he said.

In his speech at the presentation, Madu called for public sector support to help in the annual compilation of the content of the NLASCIR that is taking its financial toll on the African Centre for Supply Chain where he is the Director-General.

He said Nigeria is losing so much from cold chain logistics because of a lack of infrastructure which he noted also affects Nigerian commodities that are very expensive compared to similar commodities abroad.