ABBA YAKUBU ABDULLAH, PH.D.  

What many do not care to know, is that there is the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) agreement signed by African countries to develop Africa and link the whole continent together via rail, road and air.

All signatory countries are expected to develop a link railway to terminate at each other’s border. This means Nigeria will construct its own rail up to its border with Niger, Republic of Benin and Cameroun while the other countries will do the same.

Buhari also saw a big opportunity to position Nigeria and keyed into this AfCFTA fully. Unfortunately, most Nigerians do not care to study government policies and as a result, many do not know that there is a document called ERGP (Economic Recovery and Growth Plan), which has been improved upon and called APC NEXT LEVEL AGENDA.  It is this Agenda and AfCFTA combined that PMB is implementing jointly, to turn Nigeria into a manufacturing and producing nation, a huge economic hub for Africa.

With the creation of massive infrastructure in rails, roads, sea and air Nigeria is gradually developing infrastructurally in a way that when we produce, we can also transport the products across to boost our economy along the trade corridor emanating from Lagos to Jibia through Kano called the LAKAJI.

The LAKAJI corridor was named from the three largest cities along the trade route (Lagos-Kano-Jibia) and it runs along eight major states: Kaduna, Kano, Katsina, Kwara, Lagos, Niger, Ogun, and Oyo States.  The corridor (LAKAJI) runs for about 1,225-kilometre transport route and over 64 million people live along it, accounting for almost 30 percent of Nigeria’s population. The corridor serves three major functions: internally linking the larger producing areas in northern Nigeria to the  most populated centers in the south, exporting and shipping goods produced along the corridor and importing and distributing goods from the shipping ports of Lagos to central and northernmost states of Nigeria. Average annual daily traffic on the corridor ranges from 17,000 vehicles between Lagos and Ibadan in the south to 5,000 vehicles between Abuja and Kano in the north with about 10-14 percent of the traffic made up of heavy vehicles.

The Corridor is said to be Nigeria’s busiest transport corridor facilitating the movement of 30 million tonnes of goods per year valued at more than $6 billion and accounting for 36 percent of the country’s total Gross Domestic Product (GDP). Because  it is  a major conduit for food supplies from the North to the South, it is also a vital channel for food supplies to neighbouring countries in Niger, Chad, Cameroon, Benin.  Experts agreed the area has the potential to stimulate investment in Nigeria’s agricultural sector, linking the largest consumer market in West Africa (Lagos) with some of the highest potential agricultural zones in the region. About 33 commercially viable and relevant high priority agribusiness investment opportunities have been identified across LAKAJI, separated by state and investment categories (Inputs, production, processing, manufacturing, warehousing & infrastructure, and information and communication technologies (ICT)).

A baseline study conducted by USAID on the LAKAJI corridor further revealed that it costs over $3,000 and takes approximately 12.5 days to send a 20-foot container from Jibiya in northern Nigeria to Lagos in the southwest. Conversely, it costs nearly $5,000 and takes approximately 19.5 days to ship a 20-foot container from Lagos to Jibiya. This arose mostly in port clearance charges and this has discouraged use of Nigeria Ports by Niger and other neighboring countries. The overall cost and delivery times along the Lagos-Kano-Jibiya corridor are significantly greater than similar corridors in West Africa.

The cost of rail transport from Lagos to Kano is currently USD 0.045 per tkm (NGN 7.1 per tkm), plus the cost of insurance at 0.25 percent of consignment value. Keeping all other conditions constant on the corridor, including the vehicle transport cost from Kano to Jibiya and the informal fees along the way, using rail from Lagos to Kano could save the shipper USD 1,195 per consignment. Railway, therefore, offers the cheapest alternative to road transport that will reduce costs and times of delivery of goods from port to the hinterland and neighboring countries.

I do not have any doubt that in the days ahead, we shall toast President Buhari for his foresight in the infrastructural development especially the railways along the corridor and other strategic economic routes in the country.