Road to globally competitive industrial sector

• Published date: 09 January 2023
• Publication title: Nigeria - The Nation

There is strong optimism that with necessary political will to implement cogent policies and issues that have hindered operators, Nigeria may be on the road to sustainable industrialisation and economic recovery in 2023 and beyond. Assistant Editor Chikodi Okereocha reports.

Nigeria's struggling industrial sector, which has been performing sub-optimally in recent years, especially from early 2020, when the COVID-19 pandemic struck, looks good for a rebound this year.

Although the aftershocks of the plethora of domestic and external crises that hobbled the sector are still visible, members of the Organised Private Sector (OPS), particularly manufacturers, are optimistic of its return to the path of sustained production this year.

According to them, what is required is for the incoming government to demonstrate the political will to implement policy reforms that will support and sustain macro-economic stability, including prioritising infrastructure, security and other pro-manufacturing policies that will encourage scale and lower unit cost of production.

Successive administrations have been in the eye of the storm over alleged failure to summon the political will to implement pro-industrialisation policies and also address issues that hold promise of galvanising the manufacturing sector to unleash its capacity to create jobs and contribute significantly to the nation's Gross Domestic Product (GDP).

Such perceived woeful failure to match words with action with regards to implementing policies around ease of doing business, for instance, is believed to be responsible for the industrial sector's sub-optimal performance in recent years, especially since the outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic and now, the Russia-Ukraine war.

Indeed, lingering backlashes of the pandemic and its emerging Delta and Omicron variants, as well as the on-going conflict in Europe were said to have escalated global inflation, disrupted global supply chains and triggered rising unemployment, among others.

For instance, since Russia's invasion of Ukraine, the effects of energy supply disruptions have been cascading across everything from food prices to electricity to consumer sentiment. Energy price shocks caused rising global inflation and tighter monetary conditions, slowing global growth.

Sustained food shortages and high prices also sent millions of people across the world, including Nigerians, into acute food insecurity, heightening social unrest. And the impact of these externally-induced crises...