NEXIM to inject N36bn for SMEs’ export business in 36 states

The Nigerian Export Import Bank, (NEXIM) has said it has earmarked a minimum of N1billion for the 36 states of the federation to be disbursed to targeted export-oriented projects in the Small and Medium Scale Enterprises, (SMEs) sector.

Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, NEXIM, Mr Abba Bello, dropped this hint recently in Akure, Ondo State, disclosed that the fund would help crowd-funding investments, promote regional industrialization and economic development.

The bank together with its continental counterpart, African Export Import Bank, also announced that it had earmarked the $10million as project preparation fund for supporting pre-operational phase of project cycles.

Bello explained that this fund will help to increase the pipeline of bankable projects, towards addressing the problem of poor access to funds particularly amongst SMEs.

According to him, the fund was expected to help states benefit from the opportunities provided by the African Continental Free Trade Agreement,(AfCFTA).

In his words, “As you may all be aware, the AfCFTA, which commenced in January 2021, comes with enormous benefits, including a borderless market of about 1.2 billion people, with a combined GDP of about $3.4tn. It, therefore, offers our SMEs, particularly those engaged in cross-border trade, the opportunity to increase their sales under a more liberal market condition.

“This scheme also seeks to corporatise and on-board our informal exporters into the formal sector, and through this capture the huge volume of informal trade which has been estimated at about four times the value of recorded trade.”

He stated further that as the nation’s Export Development Bank, NEXIM was in the vanguard of promoting economic diversification towards increased jobs creation and foreign exchange earnings for the country.