By Franklin Alli
EXPORTERS in the country have moved for the scrapping of  Export Department in  the Federal Ministry of Commerce by the Federal Government, saying it’ll enhance the performance of Nigerian Export Promotion Council (NEPC).

Mr. Femi Boyede, CEO/Managing Director, Koinonia Ventures Limited, who bore the minds of the exporters said that since the country has a national export council (NEPC), the existing ‘ Export Department in the Ministry’ is uncalled-for, as this amounts to “duplication of functions.”

“If NEPC continued to remain a parastal under the Ministry, they will not have the required authority to implement strategies that they are supposed to,” he said.

Boyede, who spoke on the occasion of NEPC ‘Cocoa Export Development Interactive Session’ held in Lagos, for cocoa merchants and processors, alleged that the national export promotion council is still being subjected to “the whims and caprices of a department of export in  the Ministry.”

“The highest officer in the department in the ministry is a director.  So, when the director general of NEPC for instance, has a project, because the Council is a parastatal under the ministry, he sends his plan to the Minister of Commerce and Industry.  The Minister is a political appointee, so, he’s requesting for to be properly guided, who does he minute it to, he minutes to the most senior person in the department- a director.  By ranking, the director is junior to the person who has the vision.

So it really doesn’t make sense if we have a parastatal that is charged with development and promotion of export, which has specialists knowledge, then there’s no point having the same thing in the Federal Ministry of Commerce and Industry,” he told participants at the forum.

Boyede, who spoke on ‘Cocoa: Rediscovering ‘the gold in the crop,’ described the commodity as an enormous wealth which the country has abandoned since the discovery of crude oil.  Of all the agricultural products produced in Nigeria, cocoa has remained the most profitable export commodity for several decades accounting for 27 per cent out of the 47 per cent agricultural commodities contribute to the current GDP, according to the Central Bank of Nigeria.

He, therefore, urged for a return to cocoa economy because of its enormous advantages in terms of foreign exchange earnings, employment generation, provision of raw materials for industries,” he said.

‘Cocoa House, Ibadan was built with cocoa money, 95 per cent of roads in Lagos and South West were built with cocoa money in the 1960s/ 70s.  Isn’t it time for us to go back and develop the crop?,” he urged.

Dr. Emmanuel Aigbekaen, Director; Farming Systems Research and Extension, Cocoa Research Institute of Nigeria(CRIN), said revival of the commodity is possible through the creation of a new Cocoa Board to monitor price and development of the commodity, replanting of new trees in the 14 states and others where the commodity thrives including farmers education and provision of infrastructures in the affected cocoa producing states to stem rural-urban drift.