AfCFTA: Nigeria’s strategic objective is to capture 10% of Africa’s import by 2035 – Achimugu

The Nigerian National Action Committee on the African Continental Free Trade Area, AfCFTA, has disclosed that its strategic objective is to capture 10% of Africa’s imports by 2035, thereby doubling Nigeria’s export in the process.

This was disclosed by Franca Achimugu, Coordinator Oil and Gas Workstream, Secretariat of the National Action Committee on the AfCFTA at the Implementation Plan Adoption meeting with the Oil and Gas Workstream which was held at the Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation Headquarters, Abuja, Nigeria on Thursday.

She added that Nigeria’s mission is to become the preferred provider of value-added services to Africa.

Introducing the agreement and what the Oil and Gas sector stands to benefit from its full implementation, she said, “AfCFTA means Nigeria is no longer Africa’s largest economy, we need to sit up and get our house in order.”

She added that Nigeria is aligning itself for agreements, which comes with the elimination of tariffs.

“Basically it is local content for Africa, Africa by Africa, trade and process products between ourselves.

“For services, we can establish a mutual agreement, double intra-African trade from 15% and Africa’s contribution of global trade from 3-6% in ten years,” she said.

Introducing the agreement and what the Oil and Gas sector stands to benefit from its full implementation, she said, “AfCFTA means Nigeria is no longer Africa’s largest economy, we need to sit up and get our house in order.”

She added that Nigeria is aligning itself for agreements, which comes with the elimination of tariffs.

“Basically it is local content for Africa, Africa by Africa, trade and process products between ourselves.

“For services, we can establish a mutual agreement, double intra-African trade from 15% and Africa’s contribution of global trade from 3-6% in ten years,” she said.

On the Oil and Gas sector, she said that in 2020, Africa imported $1billion of tubes, pipes, citing that in technical services in oil and gas, Africa imported $34 billion worth of services from outside of Africa. ”If we are able to align ourselves, we should be able to provide these services to Africa,” she said. She added that this is what the Nigerian Content Development and Monitoring Board (NCDMB) is focused on in Nigeria; to reduce the ex-pat quota through training, and respond to future demands of other African countries. On Nigeria’s implementation plan, she revealed that Nigeria’s mission is to become the preferred provider of value-added services to Africa, highlighting that Nigeria’s strategic objective is to “capture ten percent of Africa’s imports from the world, to double Nigeria’s export revenue by 2035. “What needs to be done is grow export capacity of every state to $1.2 billion focusing on specific products and service value chain, “Nigeria can be a refining hub for Africa. We have geographic advantage, the quality of Nigeria’s crude, and also proximity to key raw materials, and also a major exporter of gas and oil and gas-related skilled capacity to Africa,” she said.