Stakeholders lament Nigeria’s backseat play in the $14tn global shipping industry

Stakeholders have recently raised alarm about Nigeria’s poor showing in the $14 trillion global shipping industry. The immediate past president of the Ship Owners Association of Nigeria (SOAN) Dr Mkgeorge Onyung, at SOAN’s inauguration of its new executive council members in Lagos, said Nigeria is lagging behind its contemporaries in tapping into the trillion-dollar shipping industry, stating the urgent need to deploy the use of the cabotage fund to unlock Nigeria’s economic fortunes in the global shipping industry. Also speaking, the immediate past Executive Secretary of the Nigerian Shippers’ Council (NSC), and the Chairman of the National Fleet Implementation Committee, Hassan Bello, stated that Nigeria could earn over $9.1 billion annually from freights. Bello who also doubled as the Chairman Inauguration Committee, called on the Federal Government and stakeholders in the maritime industry to increase their level of collaboration to achieve the enormous task of making Nigeria a force to reckon with in the global shipping space.