By GODWIN BIVBERE

AS part of efforts to further ensure trade facilitation and faster clearance of goods from the ports, the management of the Nigeria Customs Service, NCS, and the Nigerian Shippers’ Council, NSC, are to partner for the establishment of a Single Window, an all inclusive electronic trade platform for stakeholders.

The decision for the partnership was reached during a meeting between the two government agencies in Abuja recently when the Executive Secretary of the NSC, Hassan Bello, paid his counterpart in Customs, Dikko Abdullahi, a courtesy visit as part of consultation with various stakeholders following government’s appointment of the Council as economic regulator for the ports.

According to Bello, “We have collaborated with Customs before, especially in the era of Single Window, SW which is an electronic interface capturing various transaction. If we are able to introduce that because that is what we proposed, then the issue of clearance will be simplified.

“We will eliminate a lot of bureaucracy, which means multiplicity of documents, multiplicity of desk and the procedures will be simplified. It is not going to be cumbersome; the result of this will be efficiency, more goods coming in because Nigerian ports are in competition with her neighnouring ports.

“That is why people clear their goods from Benin Republic because you have less documentation; you have fewer desks, that is what we want Nigeria to be.”

Remained that Customs already has the Nigerian Trade Hub and whether the proposed Single Window will not be a duplication, Bello said that the Trade Hub “is the beginning of it, the Single Window is comprehensive. It means payments are being made electronically, clearance is done electronically, you have electronic manifest sent even before the ship sails so that we get ready for declaration.”

“The Customs will do their profiling even before the ship berths in Nigeria. This will eliminate a lot of red-tape, a lot of bureaucracy. Since it is electronic, a scientific interface, it makes everything not only transparent but also easier.”

On efforts to enlighten freight forwarders he said, “It depends on how you look at it. The port is just like the blind people who met the elephant; everyone will say his own version. “Freight forwarders are an extremely important group and they need to also be professionalized and possibly consolidated. It is not a trade for everybody.