The Manufacturers Association of Nigeria (MAN) wants the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to make it easier for them to get foreign exchange. They are asking to remove many rules that make it hard for manufacturers.
The outgoing Chairman of MAN in Kwara and Kogi, Chief Bioku Rahman, talked about this during their 10th Annual General Meeting (AGM) in Ilorin on Tuesday.
Chief Rahman also asked the Bank of Industry (BOI) to lower its lending rates for factories quickly.
He asked the CBN to lower interest rates by at least 1% and said the top bank should
He said, “We want the CBN to make many conditions easier for local manufacturers to get foreign exchange.”
“Also, CBN can give more foreign exchange to local factories. We ask the Federal Government to fix taxes at Federal, State, and Local Government levels.”
“We want the Federal Government to tell the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to lower interest rates on industry loans quickly.”
“The CBN should also tell commercial banks to lower interest rates on industry loans. The interest rates on industry loans and loans given during COVID-19 should be cut to one percent.”
Chief Francis Meshioye, the President of MAN, said the relationship with the state government is good.
He asked the state government to improve the roads and buildings around factory areas.
Important Things to Know
The value of the naira has gone down a lot in the last year. This has hurt manufacturers because it makes everything more expensive for them.
- Recently, manufacturers have had to pay more for raw materials from other countries. This has made their business costs go up.
- Manufacturers across the country have seen their borrowing costs go up a lot over the years. Since February 2024, the top bank has raised interest rates by 8% to 26.75%. Since May 2022, the CBN has been raising interest rates to control inflation and stabilize the foreign exchange market.
- According to an earlier report by Newslodge, the cost of borrowing money for consumer goods companies went up by over 1000% in the first half of 2024 because of higher finance costs and the falling exchange rate.
- But the top bank knows this is a problem. Governor Cardoso said interest rates would go down when inflation starts to slow down.