Top 10 exporters defy lockdown to earn $74.78m in May — CBN

Despite the lockdown introduced by the Federal Government to contain the COVID-19 pandemic spread, top 10 exporters in Nigeria have earned $74.78 million from export proceeds in May.

The Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) revealed this in its monthly economic report for the month of May, 2020.

The CBN said, “Despite the lockdown measures, export proceeds of the top 10 exporters increased by 29.78 per cent to $74.78 million from $57.62 million.”

The report showed that Olam Nigeria Limited topped the list of the top 10 exporters with a value of $21.15 million, representing 28.3 per cent of the total revenues from the export of cocoa beans, cashew nuts, and sesame seeds to Turkey and China.

The second major non-oil exporter was British American Tobacco Nigeria Limited with a value of $18.13 million or 24.2 per cent of the total. The proceed came from the export of cigarettes to Liberia, Guinea, Ghana, Cameroun, Cote d’Ivoire and Niger.

The third major non-oil exporter was Indorama Eleme Fertilizer and Chemicals Limited at $9.64 million covering 12.9 per cent of the total, realised from the export of urea fertilizer and agronomy services to Turkey and China.

According to the CBN in the report, the fourth major non-oil exporter was Valency Agro Nigeria Limited, with a value of $5.52 million (7.4 per cent), from the export of cocoa beans to Malaysia.

Starlink Global and Ideal Limited trailed with with a value of $5 million (6.7 per cent), from the export of cocoa beans to Malaysia.

Olatunde International Limited, Wacot Limited and ETC Agro Company Nigeria Limited ranked sixth, seventh and eighth on the chart with export earnings of $4.09 million (5.5 per cent), $3.48 million (4.7 per cent), and $3.09 million (4.1 per cent) respectively.

Meanwhile, Atlantic Shrimpers Limited and BC Nigeria Cocoa & Chocolate Limited were the ninth and 10th positions with , $2.39 million (3.2 per cent) and $2.29 per cent (3.1 per cent) in that order.

Despite effort to grow the non-oil sector for export values, Nigeria is still limited to major raw export products which are raw cocoa beans, cashew nuts, sesame seeds, sea frozen shrimps and chocolates to Spain, India, Japan, Vietnam and the Netherlands respectively.

According to the report, dampened global demand caused a contraction in merchandise imports to $3.92 billion in May 2020 from $4.12 billion in the preceding month and $6.51 billion in May 2019.

Non-oil products, constituting 77 per cent of total imports, declined to $3.02 billion in the review period, from $3.12 billion and $4.01 billion in April 2020 and May 2019 respectively.

The report further added that the importation of petroleum products, representing 23 per cent of total imports, fell to $0.90 billion in May 2020, from $1 billion in April 2020 and $2.20 billion in May 2019.