The Federal Government has given ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) till the end of November 2026 to complete the second phase of the National Single Window, warning that bureaucratic delays and regulatory bottlenecks hindering Nigerian exporters must be eliminated.
Minister of Industry, Trade and Investment, Dr Jumoke Oduwole, issued the deadline on Wednesday in Abuja during a high-level stakeholders’ engagement on the activation of Phase 2 of the National Single Window and the Export Tracker.
Oduwole said the second phase of the digital trade platform must tackle fragmentation, duplication and poor coordination among government agencies, which have continued to increase costs and delay export transactions.
“At the close of this engagement, we must know what we own in the Phase 2 journey, where we stand against the agreed milestones, what remains outstanding, which institutions or systems we depend on and who owns the next action, with a firm delivery date which is the end of November 2026,” she said.
The minister said the National Single Window, which became operational on March 27, had processed over 124,614 licences and permits, registered 11,096 importers and agents, and trained more than 8,000 users.
She added that the platform had facilitated about N12.59bn in regulatory payments.
“It is a long time coming for Nigeria. We have joined the league of nations with a National Single Window and, for a trading nation, it was Mr President’s target and we all need to be proud of that,” Oduwole said.
However, she cautioned that launching the platform did not mean the reform process had been completed.
According to her, the real test of the initiative would be whether businesses experienced faster, simpler and more predictable export procedures.
The National Single Window, she said, is a key component of President Bola Tinubu’s economic agenda to diversify the economy, boost non-oil exports, create jobs and build a $1tn economy by 2030.
“Trade does not happen at the border alone. It depends on the system connecting production to market, standards, finance, logistics, regulation, border processing and digital platforms,” she said.
Oduwole recalled that exporters identified seven major obstacles during the ministry’s export consultation in November 2024, with more than half of the challenges linked to duplication, fragmentation, poor coordination and inconsistent regulations.
She cited situations in which exporters’ containers were subjected to repeated inspections by different government agencies, describing such duplication as part of the administrative burden the National Single Window was designed to remove.
“Information already held by the government should not be requested repeatedly. Institutions will retain their statutory responsibilities, but exporters do not have to navigate the government’s internal complexity to complete one transaction.
“That complexity is ours to solve, not theirs to carry. They should experience the Nigerian government as one government,” she said.
Under Phase 2, export permits, certificates, licences, inspections, payments and other regulatory processes are expected to be integrated into one coordinated digital system.
The Federal Government is working towards what the minister described as an operating model of “one portal, one submission and one coordinated process.”
Oduwole said the ministry had begun aligning processes involving the Federal Produce Inspection Service, Regulatory Export Number, Standards Organisation of Nigeria (SON), Nigeria Export Processing Zones Authority (NEPZA), Nigerian Export Promotion Council (NEPC) and other institutions.
Figures presented at the meeting showed that SON had processed more than 85,000 documents through the platform, generating N9.95bn in regulatory payments, while the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) processed 38,985 documents and recorded N2.59bn in payments.
“These figures show real adoption. They also reinforce a critical lesson that go-live is not the same as readiness,” the minister said.
Earlier, Executive Chairman of the National Revenue Service, Dr Zacch Adedeji, urged participating agencies to comply strictly with the implementation timelines, stressing that the Federal Government remained committed to improving the ease of doing business.
Also speaking, Director of the National Single Window Secretariat, Mr Tola Fakolade, said five government agencies had been fully onboarded onto the platform.
They are SON, NAFDAC, the Nigerian Customs Service, Nigeria Quarantine Service and the National Environmental Standards and Regulations Enforcement Agency (NESREA).
Fakolade said 25 of the 27 airlines handling cargo in Nigeria had also been onboarded, representing about 93 per cent participation, while more than 2,523 air cargo manifests had been submitted through the system.
He added that 48 of 88 shipping lines had joined the electronic sea-manifest platform introduced about three weeks ago, with 99 manifests submitted so far.
Fakolade acknowledged that the platform experienced technical challenges during its early implementation but said the problems had been resolved.
With the second phase now focused on exports, the government expects the National Single Window to reduce processing times, eliminate repeated documentation and make it easier for Nigerian exporters to access international markets.
