The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) on Tuesday officially stopped the sale of dollars for a list of 40 items as it seeks to reduce pressure on the naira as well as preserve the country’s external reserves.
These items include rice, cement, margarine, palm kernel/palm oil products/vegetable oil, meat and processed meat products, vegetable and processed vegetable products, poultry –chicken, eggs, turkey – private airplanes/jet, Indian Incense, tinned fish in sauce – Geisha/Sardines, cold roiled steel sheet and galvanised steel sheets.
Others are roofing sheets, wheel barrows, head pans, metal boxes and containers, enamelware, steel drums, steel pipes, wires, rods, wire mesh, steel nails, security and razor wire, wood particles boards and panels, wood fiber board and panels, plywood boards and wooden doors.
In addition, sourcing of forex for the importation of toothpicks, glass and glassware, kitchen utensils, tables, textiles, woven fabrics, clothes, plastic and rubber products, soap and cosmetic, tomatoes/tomato paste and Eurobond/foreign currency bond/share purchase.
The central bank disclosed this in a circular signed by its Director, Trade and Exchange Department, Mr. Olakanmi Gbadamosi, which was posted on its website last night.
It explained that: ”These items are not banned, thus importers desirous of importing these items shall do so using their own funds without any recourse to the Nigerian forex market.”
It advised all authorised dealers to ensure strict compliance with the directive.
“In the continuing effort to sustain the stability of the forex market and ensure the efficient utilisation of forex and the derivation of optimum benefits from goods and service imported into the country, it has become imperative to exclude importers of some goods and services from accessing foreign exchange at the Nigerian foreign exchange market to encourage local production.
“The implementation of the policy will help conserve forex reserves as well as facilitate the resuscitation of domestic industries and improve employment generation,” it added.
THISDAY had on Sunday disclosed move to ban some of the items. The value of Nigeria’s external reserves is currently $29 billion.
“The only thing that will reduce pressure on our currency is by producing those things we are importing today,” CBN Governor Godwin Emefiele, had said in a forum in Lagos this January.
“We will try as much as possible not to hurt your business, but we need to be able to work together,” he had told the gathering of CEOs of firms in the country.
The central bank had devalued the naira in February and had scrapped the WDAS/RDAS, all in a bid to strengthen the naira
The regulator “will meet legitimate demand, but we will not be concerned about illegitimate demand,” Emefiele said.
“We have seen the pressure in the forex market arising mostly for the lopsided dependence on imports. Today in Nigeria, toothpick, tomato paste, furniture, rice, sugar, fish and petroleum products are all being imported into Nigeria.”
Thisday