Qadaffi2idiamin:
I just don't subscribe to this lock down. I agree with you, its us carrying green passport that'll get hurt. They call themselves VIPs. But I know soon enough we'll take back our country.

hope you have a bullet proof vest when you are protesting

Built2last:
Can we close borders for medical trips too. So that our health sector can exploded according op

And that of education. Its a case of hypocritical elite and gullible masses.

theenchanter:
the funniest thing is that Nigeria has done all the bolded, there's no ban on rice importation, forex for it is only restricted and import duty was increased, that's d reason people smuggle it more on the land border than through d seaport.

Love your response, however, I believe it's not a bright idea. We could have allowed market competition to take place and invest more in Agriculture rather than an outright ban. The move is short-sighted. Let me break it down.

We currently do not have the capacity to meet the demand for rice. In marketing, the audience decides which products to consume or not but you can always tilt them to your side if you're wise. It's an open secret that most of our political leaders do not patronise our locally made products, you can't compel people to eat what they do not love, in the end, they'll become rebellious and you'll lose.
The quality of our rice is currently not a match to those imported ones.
Looking at the employment aspect, we're losing because so many people trade with landlock countries using the land borders. We definitely can't make unemployment become worse.

The fact that smugglers are using our porous land borders is a testament that our custom officers are incompetent.

If FG is passionate about improving local productivity, we would rather be creating an enabling environment for investors. But Herdsmen and kidnappers would chase them away.

Yampotatocarrot:


I love the way you dissected your opinion and placed it in paragraphs for easy reading and comprehension.

However, I'll like you to explain further on some issues you brought up.

- The car importation, won't it be better and even provide more jobs if these manufacturers are "seduced" to come set up their plants here in Nigeria? Ive heard stories that in the past, these companies had plants in Nigeria, but they closed and moved away.

So, instead of just allowing them import, can't we seduce them to return?

- About poultry farming, trust me, there are a whole lot of people involved in poultry farming that I don't even see the need for the imported ones. But visit any cold room, and you'll see cartons of imported frozen chicken.

Is it the packaging that is making Nigerians patronise them or what?

I personally know of a lecturer in FUTO who is into poultry farming and packages it in such a way you'll think it's imported, I also know a woman at Federal junction, along Ipaja road, who operates a kind of point and kill business for poultry; you choose the one you want, she kills it and defeathers it there for you.

Shouldn't there be a way to push Nigerians into these aspects of the poultry business? Because most people look at the stress of buying a live chicken, killing it, defeathering it, and just decide to go for the imported frozen ones.

- Finally, these fishes you mentioned, the panlas, kotes and co, can't they be produced domestically? Or is there a kinda law that stipulates it must be only tilapia and catfish that we produce in Nigeria?

Please. If possible, give very practical solutions where applicable

Thanks again.

I remember that Buhari went to Japan, this year, with the hopes of convincing Toyota to set up a plant in Nigeria but Toyota passed the offer and rather discussed with Ghana. I will tell you the reason Toyota passed despite acknowledging that Nigeria is a big market for Toyota brands, they passed because Nigeria has unstable government policies and the cost of doing business in Nigeria is extremely high. The level of corruption is also a worry.

To attract manufacturers to Nigeria requires government to operate and run fiscal policies that favor industrialization, economic growth and development; that transcends party and designed for long term. Despite the available human and material resources, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) must also operate monetary policies that compliment the government effort with fiscal policies aimed at economic growth and development. We must also operate stable democracy and our electioneering should be matured and violence free.

Concerning the poultry, we must understand that effective dumping of products, substandard and otherwise, in other countries requires that it should be cheap, Infact very cheap so that the market will accept and consume it. That is why those imported poultry products come cheap and Nigerians love cheap products.

Fishing business in Nigeria must move beyond fish farming, we must embrace sea fishing too with the active promotion, incorporation and operation of the fishing companies that operate fishing trawlers - a commercial fishing vessel designed to operate fishing trawls.
This will enable us provide sea fish in large mass to compliment the catfish and tilapia that are often produced by fish farmers.
However, we must still allow importation of other fish like Titus, Croaker etc to meet aggregate local demand for fish.

Bidphil:


Love your response, however, I believe it's not a bright idea. We could have allowed market competition to take place and invest more in Agriculture rather than an outright ban. The move is short-sighted. Let me break it down.

We currently do not have the capacity to meet the demand for rice. In marketing, the audience decides which products to consume or not but you can always tilt them to your side if you're wise. It's an open secret that most of our political leaders do not patronise our locally made products, you can't compel people to eat what they do not love, in the end, they'll become rebellious and you'll lose.
The quality of our rice is currently not a match to those imported ones.
Looking at the employment aspect, we're losing because so many people trade with landlock countries using the land borders. We definitely can't make unemployment become worse.

The fact that smugglers are using our porous land borders is a testament that our custom officers are incompetent.

If FG is passionate about improving local productivity, we would rather be creating an enabling environment for investors. But Herdsmen and kidnappers would chase them away.

there's no ban on rice importation as i said earlier, rice importers can use d seaport instead of land.

Or where on earth does a country allow majority of its staple food to be imported, worse still... through land, like imported to another country through d sea, duties are paid to d country and transported to d final consumer through land without paying much duty to d govt.

spokesboy:
Let's keep a list of those people bragging here that it's a good policy. By December, they will all start crying like canary bird when the thing bite their pockets well well.
Why on earth will you support a policy that puts the deadweight loss on the citizens.
If truly we are self sufficient and efficient in producing rice locally, it will be in abundance and the price will crash naturally without any border closure but in this case, the price of local and imported rice have skyrocketed and hovering around 25k - 30k from 15k level.
This shows there is a deliberate policy to strangle the masses and they are ignorantly coming here to sing praises of a bizarre policy.
Can someone tell me who banned foreign music in the 90s before the local music and artists took over and flooded the entertainment industry. Today, Nigerians don't even keep track of what P.diddy or Beyonce is singing. That's the natural painless way things should go.
By Christmas, I hope Nigerians won't swallow their pride and go to Benin and Ghana govt. On bended knees to apologize for closing the border.
For those people too young here, please ask your uncles or aunts about the previous failures of ban on the importation of rice in the 80s - it only created wealth for the smugglers and poverty for the masses.
Let's pray these countries don't gang up and retaliate against Nigeria because we will be the biggest loser - starting from the banning of Dangote Sugar and Cement exports to the west coast which outweighs alot of our imports from the same region.

Nice ...

I don’t take this forum serious in real world affairs. I have seen a few of the ‘politically minded’ here and laugh at their predicament.

Bidphil:


Love your response, however, I believe it's not a bright idea. We could have allowed market competition to take place and invest more in Agriculture rather than an outright ban. The move is short-sighted. Let me break it down.

We currently do not have the capacity to meet the demand for rice. In marketing, the audience decides which products to consume or not but you can always tilt them to your side if you're wise. It's an open secret that most of our political leaders do not patronise our locally made products, you can't compel people to eat what they do not love, in the end, they'll become rebellious and you'll lose.
The quality of our rice is currently not a match to those imported ones.
Looking at the employment aspect, we're losing because so many people trade with landlock countries using the land borders. We definitely can't make unemployment become worse.

The fact that smugglers are using our porous land borders is a testament that our custom officers are incompetent.

If FG is passionate about improving local productivity, we would rather be creating an enabling environment for investors. But Herdsmen and kidnappers would chase them away.

Rice is just 4 MONTHS. Plant, fertilize, de-pest, scare birds and harvest.
Pls get real. The border should be locked tight. It is very disappointing the way Nigerians think. Who is talking of meeting local demand?.
Nigeria wants to be a RICE EXPORTER.
Dangote, Coscharis, about 25 state governments are going into it. Nigeria would be harvesting there times a year for every ha planted.

You dont know whats on ground.

.,

It's 2021, you still think the policy affected the economy positively?

On a lighter note, I read your posts, you come across as a refined young bachelor

martyns303:
Probably one of the best policies this government has implemented.

Let me educate someone as to why.

Nigeria is trying to be self sufficient especially in the area of rice, Nigerians consume a lot of rice, a whole lot of it and it will be best if this rice is produced locally. Not only will it boost our economy it will also reduce the strain on forex.

Now most of the rice we consume come from Asian countries like Indonesia etc, to discourage foreign rice from coming into Nigeria, the Nigerian government choose to either increase the import duty (tax) on the product or outrightly ban rice importation.

To bypass the above condition, smugglers now import the rice into Benin republic, from there they take advantage of the free trade zone thing to bring the rice into Nigeria. Now, this has become a loss/loss situation for Nigeria, because, not only is the rice still coming to Nigeria, we are not even generating tax on the imported rice because the tax has been paid to Benin republic and brought into Nigeria free.

The Nigerian government has pleaded with the neighboring countries to please help us checkmate these items from being dumped into Nigeria, but they refused, they refused because of the huge profit they are making at the expenses of Nigerians. Well, the Nigerian government has responded, we can not tell you not to allow these items come into your country, no wahala, but we will make sure it doesn’t come into Nigeria by closing our borders.

Now, they have load sh%t of rice sitting in their country and no way of moving it to Nigeria, more so business is no longer moving for them and they are now feeling the pressure.

The unfortunate thing is that, products that are locally produced in those countries can not come into Nigeria also, now it’s a loss/loss situation for them. Countries like Ghana unfortunately got caught in the cross fire, this is because Ghana do not share a land border with Nigeria and have to pass their products via one of the countries we share land border with and since we have closed the border, their products can not come in too. The government is talking with the Ghanaians to see how to resolve this problem.

Secondly, fuel in Nigeria is probably one of cheapest in Africa, this is because the Nigerian government is paying subsidy on fuel. If you don’t know what subsidy is, let me educate u. It means, if fuel is supposed to be sold for N300, the government will pay N150, and then you the citizen will pay N150. Now, after the government pay for subsidy, some wicked Nigerians will move the fuel to other countries like Benin republic and sell it off there at the rate of say N250 and make extra profit. Hope u catch the drift?

See that border ehn? Make then no open am at all. I Dey chop normal Nigerian rice now, na local chicken we dey kill chop now, no more imported frozen chicken wey dem use chemical preserve.