By Dipo Olowookere
Saying that the COVID-19 pandemic dealt a huge blow on Nigeria is stating the obvious. The contagion affected almost every facet of the nation’s life, including the economy.
The little gains the federal government was making in the area of export of agricultural products to Europe and other parts of the world, including Africa, was almost ruined.
Recently, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) released figures of the nation’s foreign trades and from the analysis done by Business Post, the value of goods and services exported between July and September 2020 reduced on a year-on-year basis.
According to the report, in the third quarter of the year, the country recorded total trades of N8.374 trillion, 34.15 per cent higher than the figures in the second quarter of the year and 8.85 lower than the corresponding quarter of 2019.
A critical look into the total value of trades recorded in Q3 of 2020 revealed that a larger component was the import side, which stood at N5.381 trillion and it was 33.77 per cent higher than the value in Q2 and 38.02 per cent higher than Q3 of 2019.
In fact, the stats office stated in its report that the value of imports in the third quarter of this year was the highest recorded for any quarter since 2017.
For the export component, it was just N2.993 trillion in the period under review, 34.85 higher than in Q2 2020 but 43.41 lower than in Q3 of 2019.
Business Post observed that the value of agricultural goods exported in the third quarter of this year depreciated by 22.6 per cent quarter-on-quarter but increased year-on-year by 43.7 per cent.
This means that when compared with the second quarter of this year, the value of agric exports reduced but when compared with the same period of last year, it increased.
Also, the value of manufactured goods taken out of the country in the period reduced by 47.7 per cent quarter-on-quarter, while the export of crude oil rose by 56 per cent.
According to the NBS report, Nigeria imported more agricultural product into the country between July and September, when the lockdown was eased by the federal government.
It was disclosed that imported agricultural goods increased in value by 21.13 per cent in Q3 2020 compared with Q2 2020, and increased by 109.82 per cent when compared with the corresponding quarter in 2019.
Also, the value of manufactured goods imported in Q3 2020 increased by 23.18 per cent just as the value of raw material brought into the nation jumped by 24.47 per cent.
Adedapo Adesanya