…experts call for modernised ports, one-stop border posts, stronger trade corridors to unlock AfCFTA’s $3.4tn market
…states have resources to develop trade corridors, Oduwole says
Nigeria’s ambition to expand exports and capture a larger share of Africa’s $3.4 trillion market is facing major logistics challenges, including port congestion, ageing infrastructure and border delays that can keep trucks waiting for more than two days, experts have warned.
At a panel session on Regional Growth Corridors and AfCFTA at the 32nd Nigerian Economic Summit in Abuja on Monday, speakers called for modernised ports, more efficient border management and stronger transport connections to reduce the cost of moving goods across African markets.
Sylvia Ekra, regional director for West and Central Africa at the International Organisation for Migration (IOM), said trucks travelling along the Abidjan-Lagos corridor spent an average of nearly 53 hours crossing the border from Nigeria into Benin, while the journey in the opposite direction took about 31 hours.
She cited a 2024 study by the Abidjan-Lagos Corridor Organisation, saying the delays increased costs for businesses and weakened the reliability of regional supply chains.
“So we are talking about businesses that are operating in an increasingly competitive environment, and we have these kind of impediments in front of them.
“So if you add to that the fact that on the regional value chains, the goods and the people have to cross several borders before they reach their final destination, then you multiply these kind of delays across the corridor. So every unnecessary delay is an impediment to the integration that we are looking for. Every repeated procedure, it comes at a cost for the businesses.
“So that is why I’m talking about the importance of the one-stop border cross, because it would eliminate the multiple checkpoints, it would eliminate the repeated document verification, and it would eliminate those overlapping inspections that are doing on both sides,” Ekra said
She advocated the wider operationalisation of one-stop border posts, where customs, immigration and other agencies from neighbouring countries coordinate their procedures to reduce repeated inspections and documentation.
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According to Ekra, an African Union-OECD study found that one-stop border posts could reduce border waiting time by 42 per cent.
She also cited World Bank modelling of the Dakar-Lagos corridor, which indicated that the estimated economic benefits of corridor improvements could double when road upgrades were combined with measures to reduce border delays.
However, she said the challenge was not necessarily the absence of policies, but weak implementation and inadequate capacity among border officials.
“We have the policies, we have a lot of the procedures and processes in place. The problem is the implementation,” she said
She called for countries along trade corridors to coordinate their border operations and implement agreed procedures consistently.
Koen De Backker, chief executive officer of APM Terminals Nigeria, said congestion within the ports themselves remained a major constraint on cargo movement, as containers stayed too long in terminals and reduced the capacity available to handle incoming and outgoing shipments.
He said Nigerian ports were built on ageing infrastructure that required modernisation to handle larger volumes of cargo more efficiently.
“The ports and terminals have been built on very old infrastructure. Infrastructure that was built just before independence, so it’s 60-70 years old, and today a modern port will be able to handle a lot more cargo,” De Backker said.
He called for greater use of alternative cargo evacuation methods, including rail and waterways, instead of relying almost exclusively on trucks to move goods into and out of ports.
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De Backker said APM Terminals had developed a logistics centre in the Ibadan area where export cargo was consolidated and loaded into containers before being transported by rail to the terminal.
He also disclosed that collaboration with the Nigeria Customs Service had enabled the company to introduce scanners for cargo inspection, reducing the time required for physical examinations.
According to him, the intervention helped reduce the average stay of import containers at the port from 18 days to 14 days, improving cargo availability and lowering costs for importers.
He argued that private-sector participation in port management should be viewed as a way to professionalise and modernise infrastructure rather than simply transfer public assets to private companies.
“I know that a number of Nigerians get worried when we hear the word privatization, we get worried that that would be a case of selling national assets, but if there was some amount of public-private or even a privatization of the ports, would that open it up to a level of development that would make it a lot easier for goods to move in and out of those ports, which means that their speed will accelerate the pace for businesses to achieve their objectives.
“It’s about professionalising infrastructure, modernising and getting experts in,” he said, noting that port operations require significant capital investment and specialised expertise.
FG expands trade corridors
Jumoke Oduwole, minister of industry, trade and investment, said the Federal Government was formalising trade corridors and expanding market access to enable businesses across Nigeria’s six geopolitical zones to export to regional and continental markets, regardless of whether their states had seaports, free zones or dry ports.
She said the government had established a central coordination committee involving about 27 agencies to coordinate implementation of the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA), with the ministry and the National AfCFTA Coordination Office playing central roles.
Oduwole said Nigeria had submitted its tariff schedules, signalling its readiness to trade under AfCFTA terms, but stressed that businesses and state governments needed better information and support to take advantage of the agreement.
The government began its subnational engagement in Kano earlier in 2026 to support businesses in the North-West, with Adamawa expected to be the next stop for the North-East.
She also said the government had introduced direct air-cargo corridors to Southern and Eastern Africa to help Nigerian businesses reach markets more cheaply.
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According to Oduwole, the government mapped 13 countries in the regions to identify market opportunities for Nigerian small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), establishing air-cargo arrangements initially with Uganda Airlines and subsequently with RwandAir.
She said the routes had reduced cargo costs by between 50 and 70 per cent, with direct flights serving about seven destinations and additional connections provided through multimodal transport.
The destinations include Rwanda, Kenya, Zambia, Botswana, South Africa, Zimbabwe and Uganda.
Oduwole said the government was also supporting digital trade and e-commerce through a regional regulatory sandbox involving about five African countries, following consultations with Nigerian technology and technology-enabled businesses on their preferred export markets.
She cited a trade mission to Botswana involving 13 Nigerian businesses, saying one company secured an order for 6,000 T-shirts during the visit, while another sold out its pre-packaged jollof rice product.
“We’ve diluted or sort of simplified air safety. We have ABC series that we’ve published in six languages, English, Yoruba, Hausa, Igbo, Arabic, and Pidgin, and that we disseminated around the country. And so we’ve also taken, we went to a trade mission to Botswana to access the region.
“We took 13 Nigerian businesses. One of the businesses got an order for 6,000 t-shirts on the spot. Another of the businesses had this pre-packed jellof rice we just sold out. These are some of the initiatives that we’ve been doing,” she said
The minister said Nigeria’s non-oil exports had been increasing year on year and that the rest of Africa had become the largest destination category for the country’s non-oil exports.
Responding to concerns about port infrastructure and the pace of reforms, Oduwole defended the administration’s investment in transport and trade infrastructure, saying major projects were being implemented across the country.
She said the National Single Window, which had been delayed for years, went live in March 2026 to automate import processes, while the export process was expected to go live at the end of November.
Oduwole also cited investments in the rehabilitation of Apapa and Tin Can Island ports, road projects, rail development and connectivity around the Lekki Deep Sea Port corridor.
She said federal allocations to states and local governments had increased their capacity to invest in infrastructure, arguing that subnational governments had the resources to improve market access and develop trade corridors.
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“Having ensured that we delivered macroeconomic stability, how we get to growth, there’s no shortcut, it’s going to take granularity,” she said.
The minister urged large businesses to support smaller firms through local sourcing, supplier relationships and value-chain development, arguing that wider participation was necessary to translate economic reforms into jobs and prosperity.
She said the country needed to move beyond policy announcements to practical measures that addressed the specific financing, regulatory and logistics challenges confronting businesses.
The AfCFTA creates a continental market of about 1.4 billion people with a combined gross domestic product of $3.4 trillion. However, speakers at the summit said Nigeria’s ability to benefit from that market would depend on how effectively it connected producers to ports, transport networks and efficient border systems.
They stressed that improved infrastructure alone would not be sufficient without coordinated implementation, reliable logistics and lower transaction costs for businesses seeking to trade across Africa.
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