Business

How implementation of quality infrastructure will accelerate economic growth — NQC

In a bid to improve the quality of products being exported from Nigeria, the Federal government has established the National Quality Council (NQC) to implement the Nigerian National Quality Policy (NNQP).

The NNQP aims to develop the National Quality Infrastructure (NQI) in order to achieve accelerated economic growth, increase exports, ensure supply of safe quality products at competitive prices and contribute towards the protection of the environment.

Speaking in Abuja, the Chairman of NQC, Osita Aboloma said the implementation of NNQP is expected to contribute to economic prosperity by realizing an effective National Quality Infrastructure (NQI) capable of raising the quality of goods and services.

He explained that the implementation of the NNQP would further increase Nigeria’s exports as well as pave the way for industrial expansion and diversification in line with the National Industrial Revolution Plan and the National Economic Recovery and Growth Plan.

“This policy supersedes other provisions in any other national sectorial quality-related policies.

“The primary objective of the NNQP is to ensure that goods and services emanating from, imported into and traded in Nigeria are designed, manufactured, packaged, labelled and supplied in accordance with the needs, expectations and requirements of the purchaser and
the consumer as well as the requirements of the regulatory authorities in the local and export markets.

“The NNQP also aims to develop an environment in which both public and private sectors can achieve excellence for product and services,” the Chairman stated.

Aboloma said; “National quality policy in Nigeria is just taking after what has been done in Africa, ECOWAS, and other continents of the world and clearly defines what is done, and how it will be done to ensure that any issue relating to quality in this clime is protected while achieving the objectives of the Federal Government.

“In approving the NQP, the government approved and said that a body must be set up to implement the policy as it is being approved and it must be a body that has responsibility in implementing the letters behind the NQP.

“To do this requires a coordinating effort. This body is not under any of the federal ministries, rather it is under the presidency, in the office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation (SGF), such that issues of bureaucracy and bottlenecks can be reduced to the barest minimum. That is to ensure that it has the power to coordinate other institutions both in the private and public sectors and achieve the objectives of the NQP.

“We have a lot of things that could be called plans, one of which is to ensure that the body is set up properly and has a structure to take off immediately. Now, the structure requires that it has a legal framework thus the FEC approval of the NNQP leading to the set up of the NQC has been gazetted.

“Secondly, there are a lot of things to be done. But basically, we have some things that we refer to as low-hanging fruits. One of them is within the shortest possible time, we want to convene a national discussion on the implementation of NQP and how it affects every facet of the economy.

“We will also carry out a gap analysis. A gap analysis will start with gathering data from every laboratory in Nigeria whether government or privately owned and what is their international capacity for testing, do they have international accreditation, and will their results be accepted because we are discussing the African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCTA) standard.

“So, when we analyze the gaps, we can then advise the government in the short-term, medium-term, and long-term. This will ensure that trade and commerce within Nigeria and neighboring countries will be to the benefit of Nigerians through job creation”.

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