The Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport (CILT), Nigeria has said that there has been no major structural change in the transport sector in the first half of 2016.
The National Director of CILT Nigeria, Mr. Paul Ndibe who disclosed this in an interview with our correspondent in Lagos said this was so because there was still no bill to support the new role conferred on the Nigerian Shippers’ Council (NSC) as the Economic Regulator of the nation’s ports.
According to Ndibe,”One would have expected that by now, there would have been a bill on that to actually give teeth to them so that they can tackle issues in the sector. The Council for the Regulation of Freight Forwarding in Nigeria (CRFFN) is still an issue. One would have expected that by now government would have been able to tidy up that aspect.
“And also in the Aviation sector, the expected National Carrier for Nigeria has not been fully established, no further official government comment on that has been made and then on the road, nothing has happened and on the rail sector, except for the new railway bill, nothing much has really happened.
“So, if you look at these critical areas of the sector, nothing has actually moved both in the logistics which I have mentioned, the Maritime, the aviation, the road which is the major artery for growth, no major shift”.
He pointed out that that was the area the institute was emphasizing that government should look at more critically so that once it controls and monitor the operators on the road sector, it would more likely engage the economy more meaningfully.
“Except that is done and incidentally with these changes going on in this sector, nothing has been done on the road sector and that has been the issue”, he said.
Mr. Ndibe noted that the increase in the pump price of the petroleum products earlier this year affected the service flow in the transportation sector adding that beyond that importation was not coming as expected thereby rendering the operators redundant since there was nothing to carry.
He said that a look at the slow pace in the importation of the petroleum products and the problems that occasioned its distribution, one would discover that it impacted on the performance in the transportation sector.
“When you aggregate all these together, it really impact on the net income of the operators in this sector. Nevertheless, the strength in operators in the transport sector is what is actually sustaining them because even in the manufacturing, foreign exchange is not available, the key areas of the economy are virtually stagnant. And if you look at the real sector, the agricultural sector because of the season we are, we are beginning to feel the impact of the produce from the farms.
“So, virtually, it is a low trend but the issue is that people have to survive and because the majority of the operators are private sector holding. So, they also try to diversify and for the fleet that are no longer in use, they try to put them away and that is why the congestion we normally find on the roads has reduced. They have not reduced because there are improvement on the structure of the roads but because the volume of traffic on our road has continuously gone down and that will impact on the economy, it will impact on the national inflation of the economy and it will also impact in the household consumption rate.
“These things vary from individual to individual and from State to State depending on the concentration of the industry, the ports and those asking for transport services. It has not been healthy for those in transportation, it is also affecting the entire economy”, he said.
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