NSC is driving ports efficiency to improve economy – Hassan Bello

The Nigerian Shippers Council (NSC) has said it is coordinating far-reaching reforms that will drive efficiency and reduce cargo dwell time from 21 days to six days at the sea ports.

The Executive Secretary, NSC, Mr. Hassan Bello, stated this Thursday when the management of Media Trust Limited, the publishers of Daily Trust, Aminiya, Kilmanjaro, and other titles paid him a courtesy call.

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The Media Trust team was led by Malam Nura Daura, the Executive Director, Finance and Investment, and Acting CEO.

Also in attendance were the Editor-in-Chief, Naziru Mikailu Abubakar, and Ahmed Shekarau, GM, Business and Strategy.

The ES of Shippers Council said the Nigerian seaports must be digitised, have 24 hours operations, have multimodal transport access to the ports, among others.

“When you have human-to-human contact, corruption, and inefficiency set in.

“So, now we are working with NIMASA, NPA and others to digitalise so that all transactions will be done online.

“We have 21 days dwell time of cargo before they are taken out.

‘Our neighbours have 7 days. We have to make it six days.”

He revealed that currently, 400 trucks with goods for exports are at the ports waiting to have access to the ports for three months.

‘This is even more depressing because some of the goods are perishable, adding that the poor infrastructure at the port is responsible for the delay.

Mr Bello also called for an export-focused economy as the era of the oil economy has gone.

““We need the government to concentrate on export and build the necessary infrastructure.

“We have so much infrastructure deficit.

“The rail is critical. Access to ports is a challenge.”

The ES also said Nigeria must stop exporting raw farm produce without processing for better economic value.

“Because of the COVID-19, we want to introduce a law that bars raw exports of raw agric produce without value addition.

‘There must be processing and packaging,” he revealed.

Earlier, the Acting CEO of Media Trust, Nura Daura, told the ES that the purpose of the courtesy was to explore areas of cooperation between the two organisations to add more value to the economy.