Agricultural Trade Policy and Export Competitiveness of Nigerian Agricultural Commodities

This study examines agricultural trade policy instruments and their implications for the export competitiveness of Nigerian agricultural commodities. Nigeria has significant agricultural export potential in cocoa, sesame, cashew, shea, ginger, and other commodities, but export performance has been constrained by quality standards gaps, trade policy inconsistencies, infrastructure limitations, and weak value chain coordination. This study uses a trade policy analysis methodology, reviewing Nigeria's trade policy instruments including export taxes, quality certification requirements, export promotion programmes, and bilateral trade agreements from 2019 to 2023. Revealed comparative advantage indices are computed for key agricultural export commodities using UN COMTRADE data. Export supply response analysis examines how policy changes affect export volume and value. Findings reveal that Nigeria has revealed comparative advantage in cocoa, sesame, cashew, and ginger, but export realisation relative to potential is significantly constrained by phytosanitary compliance failures, poor port logistics, and inconsistent export ban policies. The cocoa export supply chain shows the most developed quality certification infrastructure, while sesame and shea have significant quality compliance gaps. The study concludes that improving export competitiveness of Nigerian agricultural commodities requires simultaneous trade policy reform and value chain investment. It recommends a National Agricultural Export Competitiveness Strategy with commodity-specific quality and logistics improvement roadmaps.

Keywords: agricultural trade policy, export competitiveness, Nigeria, commodity exports, value chains.