Nigeria’s to review Trade Policy at WTO meeting

Nigeria to review Trade Policy at WTO meeting
Hauwa Noroh Ali, Abuja

The Vice Chairman of Enlarged National Focal Point on trade matters, Professor Oyejide Ademola has said that Nigeria Trade Policy would be reviewed at the Fourth   World Trade Organisation (WTO) meetings in Geneva.

At a meeting of the Enlarged National Focal Point, comprising of all stakeholders who will represent Nigeria at the Fourth WTO Trade Policy Review held at the Federal Ministry of Commerce and Industry’s Conference room in Abuja, Ademola said the purpose of the review was to restore confidence and assurance to the process of export and import in Nigeria.

Necessary policy review

Professor Oyejide said that it was important to review and update the trade policy to ensure that legal institutional framework and strategy as well as the role of Federal Ministry of Commerce and Industry as the coordinator of the whole process was well established.  

He said that whatever challenges being experienced on the current policy would be reviewed to reflect modern reality as trade had being given recognition as central to Nigeria’s development.

The Vice-Chairman noted that Nigeria had not built institutional frame work to tackle the problems of dumping, inferior and sub-standards goods in line with the rules and regulations of WTO. He said: “The legal framework to do the investigation is not yet available.”

WTO meeting

Earlier, the Director of Trade, Federal Ministry of Commerce and Industry, Mr David  Adejuwon  stated  that the 4th WTO trade policy review of Nigeria has been scheduled for June 28-30, 2011 at the WTO Secretariat in Geneva, Switzerland and Nigeria delegation would be led by the Permanent Secretary of the Ministry, Dr Abubakar Mohammad.

 He noted that the review meeting in Geneva would be held under the auspices of the Trade Policy Review Body (TPRB) of the World Trade Organisation stating that the Trade Policy Review (TPR) was one of the key functions of the World Trade Organization under the WTO Trade Policy Review Mechanism (TPRM).

The TPRM is a transparency tool that aims at ensuring adherence to all WTO members to rules and disciplines of the Multilateral Trading System (MTS).

The review exercise was established in 1989 to provide a platform for collection, evaluation and appreciation of WTO members’ trade policies and practices and their impact on the functioning of the multilateral trading system.

The meeting held in Abuja had stakeholders in the trade sector drawn from the public and private sectors such as CBN, NEXIMBank, EFCC, BPE, FIRS, NIPC, PHCN, NEPC, NEPZA, National Planning Commission, NAFDAC, NNPC, Nigeria Customs Service, Federal Ministry of Transport, Finance, Environment and Commerce and Industry as well as Federal Dept. Of Fisheries, OSGF, FRSC and Nigeria Agric. Quarantine Service in attendance.

Williams