You know how when people want to start all out with the motivational speeches on how Nigeria tops the charts of countries with the largest imports in the world. Anyways, as true as that sounds, that’s a major blunder. The most importers the world over are countries you’d least likely expect.

 

They include the United States of America, the European Union, China, Germany, Japan, France, the United Kingdom, Hong Kong, South Korea and Canada.

 

Notice anything in particular? Well, I did. They are all world powers of some sort and so one would wonder why they import the most in the world. But here’s why. If you equally study the compilation of countries that export the most, these same countries appear but in a different position, especially China that appears third above but tops the list of exporters.

 

And guess what? Their buy-ins are mostly in the categories of electronics, medical supplies, fuel, vehicles, and any other thing that is not food. Their imports are either supplies for manufacturing and upkeep but nothing edible. They grow what they eat and even sell the excess to other nations because that’s one sure way to survive.

 

But welcome to Nigeria that isn’t on the top list of exporters but imports almost anything even down to the refined crude that we produce. Did you know that we import wheat, raw sugar, rice, palm oil, all of which we produce in substantial quantity?

 

This malady begs the question; what exactly is the problem?

 

It’s not far-fetched. If we must feed the over 402 million people that Nigeria will accomodate by 2050, then we must wake up. We must stretch ourselves to produce what we eat. To utilize these food produce in order to meet various other needs that aren’t food-related like alternative sources of power and fuel like Japan does. We must work out modalities to generate revenue from the surplus and from the sale of the by-products from the extraction process because that’s obvioulsy the only way out.

 

Or do you have any other options?