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Nigerian-Brazil Bilateral Trade hits N1.5trn

By on October 5, 2012

President Silva of Brazil and President Jonathan (r)

The Nigerian Brazilian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (NBCCI) disclosed that bilateral trading between Nigeria and Brazil reached a total of $9.6 billion (N1.5 trillion) in 2011.
 
The President of the chamber, Mr. Emmanuel Ibru while speaking at the Nigerian Brazilian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (NBCCI) 3rd anniversary cocktail in Lagos, stated that because of the value of the Nigerian crude oil export, Nigerian has had the upper hand in the trade agreement.
 
The president said, “The total figure of bilateral trade between Nigeria and Brazil for 2011 stood at $9.6 billion. Nigerian import from Brazil was $1.2 billion while her export to Brazil was $8.4 billion.”
 
He advised for the need to correct the adverse trade balance against Brazil, to correct the issue, Nigerian and Brazil will have to continue in their trade arrangements to make right the wrong.
 
According to him, “There is a big potential for the flow of goods and services from Brazil and there is again, the question of making information available to the business community here in Nigeria of what is available in Brazil that Nigerians require. In addition, Brazilians have a lot of manufacturing and agricultural expertise; they can also export to Nigeria not just the finished product but they can also export the technical expertise to come and help Nigeria set up businesses over here.”
 
“Another thing is joint venture between Nigerian and Brazilian companies. A situation where we are producing here and exporting to Brazil, and then creating employment in Nigeria and the Nigerian economy is getting an advantage not just from there but also from the sale of the goods over there.”
 
“They should give Nigerian manufacturers the enabling environment to produce our goods with a comparative advantage and you find that they require a lot of things, the oil is obvious. If there is a comparative advantage we can attract Brazilian companies to come over here and manufacture here, with that it becomes a two-way thing and not we pushing oil over there,” he added.
 
 
He called on Brazil to set up companies in Nigeria, that the collaboration will serve Nigeria, Brazil and the West African sub-region in general. 
 

He disclosed that, the Chamber’s major challenge is the inavailability of a direct air link between Nigeria and Brazil, “To get to Brazil from Nigeria is very difficult, so this is challenging in terms of cost, and in terms of travel,” he said.
 
“The Brazilians come from a different culture, they are Portuguese speaking, so they don’t know much about the Nigerian market being an Anglophone market, so when you go to them to talk to them how important it is to come here and establish they are a little bit worried and disturbed because they don’t know the market.”
 
In his words, “Major export products include aircraft, coffee, vehicles, soybean, sugar, rice, orange juice, iron ore, steel, textiles, footwear, electrical equipment, and others. Brazil’s current account surpluses had continued to hit record levels, indicating that exports were growing strongly.”