ABUJA: The Nigeria Export Promotion Council, NEPC, has predicted increment in the revenue from non-oil export to $25 billion in 2025 from the current $2.7 billion. Executive Director of the NEPC, Olusegun Awolowo, who disclosed this in Benin at a one day workshop on “The Legal Aspects of Export Contract” uring the weekend, said strategy had been put in place to achieve the projection through a developed “Zero Oil Plan.” Represented by the Director of the legal unit, Mr. Ezra Yakusak, the NEPC boss described the zero oil plan as a strategy adopted to mobilise both private and public resources towards replacing oil as the country’s major source of foreign exchange. He said this became inevitable in the face of the recent free fall of oil price in the world economy. He stressed that the era of Nigeria depending on oil as its primary sources of foreign exchange was gone.
According to him, the country’s continued reliance on oil would only decrease its economic fortunes, stressing that it was high time the nation embarked on non-oil exports. He explained that the Council had taken a proactive step at increasing Nigeria’s foreign exchange earnings through non-oil exports by developing the zero oil plan.
He said, “The zero oil plan is a coherent agenda to mobilise the public and private resources towards replacing oil as our number one source of foreign exchange. “Under the plan, Nigeria will position itself to gain at least a five per cent share of a total value of world exports in strategic sectors over the next 10 years, to ensure sufficient scale of production and prevent sudden market distortions.
“At the end of ten years, it is hoped that our non-oil export revenue would increase from $2.7bn in 2014 to $25bn in 2025.” He further revealed that the Council, in collaboration with an indigenous export consulting firm, was undertaking a practical and detail packaged training series that would build a crop of knowledgeable exporters to raise the contribution of the non-oil export sector to the Gross Domestic Product of the country.
According to him, the training tagged ‘The making of new Exporters’ aims at hand-holding would-be exporters through the entire process of export business from conception to execution and after care by experts from the sector who will play the role of mentors.
The programme, which was slated to run for nine months, was targeted at creating market opportunities for Nigerian exporters as well as providing a veritable platform for training new crops of exporters that would help enhance the quality of Nigeria’s exportable goods. Earlier in her address, the zonal Controller of the Benin zonal office of the NEPC, Mrs. Etokowoh Moses said the workshop would offer participants better understanding of international contracts terms. She also noted that the participants would be exposed to risks management associated with genuine export contracts. “As you are aware, most international trade transactions fail to yield fruitful results due to the inability of parties to successfully initiate and satisfy the legal requirements of a genuine export contract,” she said.
Meanwhile, the Special Adviser to the Edo State Governor on Small and Medium Enterprise, Mr. Daniel Akhilele, admonished the participants on the need to open new frontiers in their businesses. He said that Nigerians must understand what it takes to move their businesses beyond their communities.