The Export Expansion Facility Programme amplifies grant effect with Export and Sell Partnership

The Export Expansion Facility Programme amplifies grant effect with Export and Sell Partnership

The Federal Government of Nigeria, implemented through the Nigerian Export Promotion Council (NEPC) launched its one-year intervention Export Expansion Facility Programme (EEFP), in early 2021. The Programme, which was geared towards disbursing a 50 billion Naira Export Development Fund (EDF) that was part of the Federal government’s N2.3 Trillion Economic Sustainability Plan, has since catered to 1,100 businesses export-facing affected by the pandemic.

To amplify the effect of the Fund (EDF), the NEPC empowered a business focused on capacity building – training Nigerian businesses on the rudiments of improving their export. The business, Export and Sell – has also been tasked with training and onboarding over 10,000 Nigerian businesses on Amazon (US).

Speaking on the task the NEPC saddled the company with, the Chief Executive Officer, Export and Sell, Nduka Udeh, explained, “They had very stringent requirements in the agreement that we signed. Because they have seen the need for training to get Nigerians exporting, one of the key requirements was to offer an online training
portal that will enable thousands of Nigerian businesses to go online and learn the proper way to export.”

Speaking further, he said, “There is a difference between just putting your goods on a plane and having someone ship it and doing the right thing.” According to him, doing the right thing, in this sense, entails products meeting the quality for export which ensures that products from Nigeria are not rejected in the ports of other countries.

Projecting the effects the training would have, Udeh stated, “If you drill down into what we are doing – helping businesses to export. It has a huge ripple, multiplier effect across the economy; because if you have a company that was doing, maybe, a thousand dollars of sale and you can get them exporting, selling on Amazon – where
you have 33 billion dollars in monthly sales; if you can take that 1,000 dollars in sales to about 50,000 or 100,000 dollars, then you are going to have that company employing so many people.”

Commenting on the impact of the fund on the beneficiary, the Programme Coordinator, Maureen Ideozu explained “To capitalise on Amazon’s $400billion market, it was important to have Nigerian businesses listed on big e-tailers like Amazon US. The EEFP’s partnership with Export and Sell aims to provide Nigerian non-oil exporters with an end-to-end experience: training on how to label their product that meets US regulators requirements, warehousing of the product, listing and sales.” She further explained, “when Made-in-Nigeria listed businesses can bolster their revenue and earn in dollars, it improves their ability to scale, create employment and broaden their tax remittance to the Nigerian government.”

So far, the Export Expansion Facility Programme has, through the EDF, increased Export and Sell’s training capacity from 1,000 business to over 10,000. With funds from the grant, the company has launched an online training platform and has also secured a training facility in Lagos, Nigeria.

With the cumulative experience of Export and Sell’s CEO culled from over a decade as the Managing Director of the American Airsea Cargo, Nigerian businesses can be better equipped for export and meet standards that permit them to be listed on Amazon (US).

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