Nigeria contributes 70% of products under ECOWAS trade –FG

Nigeria provides between 60 to 70 per cent of products under the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Trade Liberalisation Scheme, the Nigerian government has said, adding that the country has more than 2,400 firms with over 6,900 products under the programme.

Zubairu Dada, the Minister of State for Foreign Affairs, gave the revelation on Thursday at a consultative workshop on ECOWAS post-2020 Vision and how the new vision 2050 would reflect Nigeria’s interests.

He said the workshop planned to articulate stakeholders’ opinions on the impact of ECOWAS Vision 2020 and the expectations of the Nigerian people in respect of the ECOWAS Vision 2050 document.

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“Under the ECOWAS Trade Liberalization Scheme, the region has eliminated over 95 per cent of trade barriers along the border of member states.

“Presently, Nigeria has over 2,400 companies, with over 6,900 products under the scheme. Nigeria alone accounts for 60-70 per cent of the products under ETLS”, Dada said.

The minister stated that ECOWAS had created a roadmap for a post-2020 Vision for the sub-region as the December 2020 deadline for ECOWAS Vision 2020 drew near and reaction to several perennial challenges facing the region became imperative.

Dada added that successes recorded by ECOWAS in the past years included positive developments in many West African nations.

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