Bakers have vowed to react to price increase in baking ingredients by increasing the prices of bread.

The Premium Breadmakers Association of Nigeria and the Association of Master Bakers and Caterers of Nigeria gave this warning on Thursday at a press conference in Lagos.

The President, PBAN, Tosan Jemide, complained that businesses had been comatose due to the incessant increase in the prices of baking ingredients.

He noted that in the last six months, the prices of flour, sugar and other baking ingredients had skyrocketed without a corresponding increase in the prices of bread by member bakeries.

Jemide said, “We have been busy helping them remain profitable while our businesses suffer, because we are more in tune with the purchasing power of the consumer and are deeply concerned about food security.

“PBAN and AMBCN shall no longer take seat and watch such blatant increases in prices going forward. We shall react with equal price increases or stiff resistance.”

The founder of Stanbic IBTC Bank Plc, Mr Atedo Peterside, has complained that only Dangote Industries Limited is allowed to move goods across the border amid the closure of the country’s land borders.

Nigeria’s land borders have been closed to its West African neighbours for more than a year as part of efforts to check the smuggling of contraband into the country.

Peterside said on Tuesday that legitimate exporters and importers should be allowed to move their goods across the borders.

“Allowing legitimate exporters and importers to move their goods across the border should be a no-brainer.

“Why refuse everybody else and allow only one company (Dangote)?

“This is why some of us argue that the Nigerian economy is rigged in favour of a handful of well-connected persons,” he said on his Twitter handle.

The value of the nation’s non-oil exports declined by 11.1 per cent to $320m in August on the back of the border closure, according to the Central Bank of Nigeria.