By Nume Ekeghe
Shoptomydoor.com, one of the leading shipping and mailing service company that complements e-Commerce, said it plan to tap into the organic food markets and has launched an easy and cheap initiative to promote exports for small and medium scale enterprises (SMEs).
Speaking at the launch of Shoptomydoor export services in Lagos at the weekend, the company’s Managing Director, Mr. Nduka Udeh, said the initiative was aimed at increasing export in Nigeria for fashion, solid mineral, cosmetics, article of wood and agricultural products.
Udeh said: “We are offering to ship sample of products for potential small medium companies free to the American market to give them access. There is so much Nigerians can do that we are not utilising and that is what we are trying to do.”
Speaking on how much potential the Nigerian market has, he said: “The retail market for food in the US is valued at about $800 billion and how much of it is Nigerian which makes 100 per cent organic products?
“You would see that we make up a very small quantity. If we get our acts right, we can tap into $10 billion to $20 billion of that food market. So those are the size of the market we are trying to see how we can open.
“Even if we are able to open up only $100 million, it is still a huge opportunity that would affect the lives of thousands if not millions of Nigerians.”
On foods, he added: “We are going to start with dry food, not the fresh ones because the facility to ship fresh food is not really there so with the dry foods and processed foods, you would have longer shelf life.
But because they are organic and not genetically modified, there is a huge demand for it in the US.”
He further said: There is actually a lot ofcomplexities in the Nigerian export process. And we are working with people like the NAPC to look at how to simplify it. “The process of export in Nigeria is one of the most complex in the world. The process of forms, inspections is out of this world.”
