For the third time this year, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has increased the exchange rate for calculating customs duties at the nation’s seaports to N1,417.635/$.
With the upward review, Nigerians will pay more to clear their goods at the port because import duties are benchmarked against the dollar.
According to information obtained from the official website of the Nigeria Customs Service, the exchange rate was revised upward on Friday, February 9, from N1 413.62/$ to N1 1,417.635/$.
This represents an increase of N4.015 and a 0.28 per cent percentage increase, which is below the official CBN exchange rate of N1,481.982/$ as of the morning of Saturday, February 10, 2024.
REPORTERS AT LARGE’s checks reveal that the current upward review of the exchange rate for calculating customs import duty is the third in one week and the third in 2024.
It is also the seventh time the apex bank has adjusted exchange in eight months since President Tinubu’s administration commenced the floating naira policy, a reform to stabilise the forex market.
The Nigerian Customs adjusted the exchange rate from N422.30/$ to N589/$ on June 24, 2023, and again on July 6, 2023, to N770.88/$. On November 14, 2023, it was adjusted to N783.174/$. In December, it was adjusted to N951.941/$. On February 2, it was moved to N1 356.883/$, and on February 3, it was raised to N1 413.62/$. Now, it has been raised to N1,417.635/$.
Experts warned that the continued hike in import duties will raise the country’s prices of imported goods and services.
Bisiriyu Fanu, the former chairman of the Association of Nigerian Licensed Customs Agents at Seme Border, said the hike in customs duty through high FX rates will affect all goods in the market because every commodity in the market has imported input.
Earlier, the Director of the Centre for the Promotion of Private Enterprise, Muda Yusuf, lamented that increased import duty would further impoverish Nigerians.
