•Finance minister, Wale Edun
Five months after the federal government announced a 150-day window for free importation of food items, the policy is yet to be implemented.
The government had on July 8, 2024, announced the duty-free import window for food commodities so as to ensure a reduction in food inflation in the country, reports Daily Trust.
The window ought to have elapsed on December 31, 2024.
The food commodities for which the duty waiver was meant include maize, husked brown rice, wheat and cowpeas.
Since that announcement, neither the government nor the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) has provided details on the implementation mechanism.
In the third quarter of 2024, the Customs said the government might forgo N188.37 billion in revenue over the next six months due to the duty waiver granted on the importation of staple foods.
The Comptroller-General of the NCS, Adewale Adeniyi, at that time said the country spent N3.82 trillion on importation of wheat, beans, rice and maize between 2020 and 2023.
The Customs had also on August 14, 2024 said in order to participate in the import wavier, a company must be incorporated in Nigeria and have been operational for at least five years.
It said the Ministry of Finance would periodically provide the NCS with a list of importers and their approved quotas to facilitate the importation of these basic food items within the framework of this policy.
The implementation of the policy is suffering a delay amidst the rising inflation on imported food items in the country.
The rise has been attributed to multiple factors, including the currency devaluation and the global supply chain disruptions.
The average price of imported high-quality rice has surged by 144.77 per cent year-on-year.
The recent report on the Consumer Price Index by the Nigerian Bureau of Statistics (NBS) showed that Nigeria’s imported food inflation surged to 42.29 per cent in November 2024, a significant rise from 23.74 per cent recorded in November 2023, representing a 55 percentage point year-on-year increase.
According to the NBS, on a month-on-month basis, imported food inflation rate increased from 40.96 per cent in October 2024, a 1.33 percentage point rise in just one month.
The data showed the continued rise in imported food inflation throughout 2024, which began at 26.29 per cent in January.
Subsequently, by October, the inflation rate had crossed the 40 per cent threshold, and November’s figure of 42.29 per cent is the highest recorded in the past two years.
Finance ministry responsible for importers’ identification – Customs
Reacting in a chat with our correspondent yesterday, the National Public Relations Officer of the NCS, Aliyu Maiwada, said it is the duty of the Ministry of Finance to identify importers.
“The federal government, through the Federal Ministry of Finance, is responsible for the policy formulation and identification of designated importers for the policy while the Nigeria Customs implements.
“Therefore it is a gradual process and it is in progress,” he stated.
The Director Press in the Ministry of Finance, Mohammed Manga, declined comment on the issue when our correspondent contacted him yesterday.
Manga neither answered calls nor replied to a text message sent to his mobile telephone line.
Efforts by our correspondent to get a comment from the Ministry of Agriculture yesterday were unsuccessful as the minister’s spokesman, Kingsley Osadolor, did not respond to phone calls and a text message sent to him.
Hunger will worsen – Expert
A development expert at the Abuja Chamber of Commerce and Industry, Joseph Momoh, in an interview with our correspondent yesterday, said unless the zero import duty is implemented, hunger would get worse in the country.
“The waiver was expected to target low-income households. However, it is a new year and nothing has happened. By now, the window is expected to have closed, but unfortunately, we have not even started.
“Food inflation continues to strain households, with many consumers reporting that the prices of essential items remain high.
“Currently, the price of a 50kg bag of rice, both local and foreign, is an average of N106, 000 and N120,000, respectively, higher than Nigeria’s minimum wage of N70,000. The government needs to do something,” he said.
