No doubt, the hues and cries that greeted last year’s total closure of land borders may have metamorphosed into blessing as the nation’s Manufacturers’ Production Value (MPV) has shut up by 41.8%.
This was revealed in the Manufacturers Association of Nigeria (MAN) Economic Review of the Second Half of 2019, which stated that “the increase in manufacturing production within the period was ascribable to improved volume of activity in some sectors on account of the border closure and the relative tranquility in the foreign exchange market.” In addition, the review also showed that in the second half of 2019, inventory of unsold finished manufactured goods dropped marginally in the sector to at N202.16 billion, down by N23.73 billion (10.5 percent) when compared with N225.89 billion recorded in the corresponding half of 2018. “The development can have attributed to the closure of land borders of the country within the ECOWAS regions which made Nigerians resulting to the purchase more of locally manufactured goods in the period,” said MAN.
This means further that the marginally favourable performance recorded by the Nigerian manufacturing sector in the second half of the 2019 has been attributed largely to the border closure announced by the federal government last year.
Otherwise, the current period under review, has shown that Nigeria’s MPV grew by N2.77 trillion in the second half of 2019, which represented 41.8 per cent increase when compared to its performance within the same period in 2018.
