The Effectiveness of the EU-Nigeria Trade and Development Facilitation Office: An Empirical Review

This study empirically reviews the effectiveness of EU-Nigeria trade and development facilitation mechanisms, focusing on the operational impact of EU-funded trade windows, business development centres, and bilateral trade facilitation offices established in Lagos, Abuja, and Kano between 2015 and 2024. Trade facilitation is a central plank of EU-Nigeria economic cooperation, yet systematic empirical reviews of specific facilitation infrastructure's performance are absent from the academic literature. This analytical study employs a mixed-methods design, combining quantitative analysis of EU-Nigeria bilateral trade volume trends, exporter uptake rates for facilitation services, and non-tariff barrier reduction metrics with qualitative case studies of individual facilitation programmes. Primary data from interviews with Nigerian exporters who have used EU-funded facilitation services, alongside EU programme monitoring data and independent evaluation reports, provide empirical grounding. The study tests whether access to EU-funded trade facilitation services is significantly associated with improvements in exporters' compliance performance, market access, and export revenue. Regression analysis controls for firm size, sector, and geographic location. Findings are expected to fill a critical empirical gap in the literature on EU-Africa trade facilitation effectiveness and to provide evidence-based recommendations for the design of the next EU-Nigeria trade support programming cycle. Keywords: EU trade facilitation, Nigeria exporters, empirical review, export performance, bilateral trade.