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By Steve Agbota
Experts in the shipping industry have advocated more allocation of cargo for indigenous shipowners to arrest capital flight of an estimated $9 billion in freight costs paid annually to foreign shipping lines.
They also called for total implementation of sections 35-38 of NIMASA Act 2007 as it has a lot of benefits for the shipping sector.
The experts who spoke at the book launch of Nigeria’s Shipping Policy and Maritime Trade up to the early 21st Century and Indigenous Cargo-Carrying Capacity Advocacy Awards in Apapa on Thursday, said that allocating more cargo to local shipowners would enable them to compete favourably with their foreign counterparts.
The President of Masters Mariners, Captain Tajudeen Aloa said that if the shipowners can get cargo, they would get more ships, saying if they get ships, there would be multiplier effects of engagement.
“ So that portion of the law, we want to bring into the timeline. We want the stakeholders and everybody to challenge the system so that that law will be guaranteed. We are not asking for more, we want to guarantee the law is affected by the various benefits of the nation,” he said.
Also, President of Nigerian Chamber of Shipping, Alhaji Aminu Umar said that at a stage when cargo allocation was done, a lot of local shipowners were able to do cargo business.
“Today, a few Nigerian shipowners are participating in Nigerian cargo. shipping movement. Not only because the Nigerians don’t have the capacity to participate because there is a high monopoly on the cargo.
“There is a monopoly even if you have the cargo, you don’t have the vessel, you will end up bankrupt. We used to believe that this business was thriving. We have seen most people that are bankrupt, close their companies other things and after that many things were closed,” he said.
He believes that it is pertinent to any country in the world to have cargo reservations for their shipowners, saying that almost all shipping nations in the world make certain cargo reservations originated or end up in their country.
He said the only way Nigeria can build a very dynamic cargo shipping industry in the country is to be able to have cargo reservations and protectionism.
While speaking in the benefits of implementing sections 35-38 of NIMASA Act 2007, the book author, Dr. Edmund Chilaka, said that it would expand NIMASA’s operational portfolios of strategic mandates for overall national development.
According to him, it will enable the reactivation of dormant sectors of the marine and blue economy such as international cargo carrying activities by indigenous carriers.
“The Act would arrest capital flight of an estimated $9 billion in freight costs paid annually to foreign shipping lines. Nigerian carriers stand to repatriate a substantial part of this cost when they participate in the carriage of federal, state, and local government cargoes in line with sections 35-38 of the NIMASA Act 2007,” he explained.
He said that the Act will enable the revival of comatose indigenous carriers and the maritime sector. In the new dispensation, many indigenous carriers will be licensed in readiness to carry Nigeria’s generated cargoes annually.
He added that there will be an expansion of Nigeria’s total maritime trade, earnings, ancillary development of the other non-oil economies and ultimately increase GDP in the country and among other benefits.
