The Nigeria Incentive-Based Risk Sharing System of Agricultural Lending (NIRSAL) has advocated for the Secured Agricultural Commodity Transport & Storage Corridor (SATS-C) to become operational.
The SATS-C is a model that delivers a seamless supply-chain mechanism for handling agro-allied commodities such as inputs, raw materials, processors, and exporters. This system is meant to combat post-harvest losses, create jobs, and increase the contribution of the agriculture sector to Nigeria’s GDP. According to NIRSAL’s Managing Director/CEO, Mr. Aliyu Abdulhameed, a fully functional SATS-C policy would lead to a 5% increase in Nigeria’s GDP. The Federal Ministry of Industry, Trade and Investment (FMITI) are preparing the document for this policy for consideration. The policy review is currently at the stakeholder identification and engagement stage.
The Minister of Industry, Trade and Investment, Otunba Adeniyi Adebayo, stated that the implementation of this policy would also shorten service delivery times on clearance and haulage in the agricultural supply chain, while simplifying and harmonizing procedures and standardization of products. MSMEsToday also gathered that the ministry is preparing to execute a Common Service Charter that will enforce adherence to the rules in a bid to accelerate the implementation.
Implementing this new policy would have various benefits for Nigeria, as it would boost the national capacity to improve on the implementation status of the WTO Trade Facilitation Agreement, promote the One State, One Product Initiative of the Zero-Oil Plan, and bring about an overall reduction in post-harvest losses. This policy also aims to harmonize tax schemes, which will remove the problems of multiple taxation, extortion, and post-harvest losses. A reduction in post harvest losses would mean reduction in food prices for the final consumer. In addition, the policy would create about 125,600 direct and indirect jobs, and with an increase in standards, there would be greater access to export, industrial and consumer markets.
In the spirit of collaboration, the policy would work hand-in-hand with other concepts and models such as NIRSAL’s PH-P3 (Primary Productions and Harvest, Primary Processing, Primary Transport and Primary Storage), One-Stop-Shop (OSS) Policy and the Road Crime Control System (RCCS), amongst others.
