The Federal Government has cried out that within the last half decade, more than 103 Nigerian export products were rejected for being of substandard quality.
Minister of Industry, Trade and Investment, Mr Olusegun Aganga raised the the concern in Abuja on Thursday while unveiling the new office complex of the Standards Organisation of Nigeria.
The minister said the high volume of rejected products was not acceptable.
He attributed the development to lack of accredited laboratories in the country, where the products could be tested before being shipped abroad.
“While the rate of rejected products exported from Nigeria was over 103, countries like South Africa and Ghana had just six and seven rejected products,” the minister said.
However, the minister added that the reforms carried out by the out-going federal government has established an internationally-accredited laboratory in Lagos, which would help to check the drift.
“Since the laboratory in Lagos meets international standard, any product tested there would be acceptable anywhere outside the country, thus saving the huge revenue being lost to manufacturers and countries wherever there was product reject,” Aganga said.
“We all say we want to diversify the economy with a view to increasing our income from non oil products. But there is no way we can achieve this without having quality infrastructure such as the laboratory.”
He said as an example that the country could not export yam to the United Kingdom because it does not have a laboratory to test the products.
Aganga added: “Those who export products in Nigeria take them to Ghana to test them and the credit goes to Ghana,” he added.
“In the last five years, Nigeria has more than 103 rejects. If you compare that to other African countries like South African and Ghana, who only have between six to seven rejects, our is unacceptable.
“We are having this rejects because we did not have accredited laboratory in the country. However, we can confidently say we have addressed that challenge now.
“About two days ago, I commissioned a new internationally accredited laboratory in Lagos. It is first time ever that we will be having such an accredited laboratory with such scope, twelve scopes.”
