LAGOS, Nigeria (AP) \u2014 Nigeria’s government has banned the export of raw shea nuts, an essential raw material in many cosmetic products, in a bid to grow the country into a global supplier of refined shea butter and other skincare ingredients.<\/p>\n
The immediate ban on the crop will be in place for six months and then reviewed, Vice President Kashim Shettima said.<\/p>\n
Nigeria follows a growing list of other West African countries, including Burkina Faso, Mali, Togo, Ivory Coast and Ghana, that have banned or restricted export of the crop in the past two years.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe ban will transform Nigeria from an exporter of raw shea nut to a global supplier of refined shea butter, oil, and other derivatives,\u201d Shettima said Tuesday.<\/p>\n
He added that the decision was not \u201can anti-trade policy but a pro-value addition policy designed to secure raw materials for our processing factories” and boost income and jobs for rural workers.<\/p>\n
Raw shea nut is pulverized and processed to produce shea butter, a key ingredient for manufacturing products like lotion, shampoos, conditioners and moisturizers.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is one of the most important bases for skincare, especially now that a lot of people are tilting toward nontoxic skincare,\u201d said Zainab Bashir, an Abuja-based dermatologist.<\/p>\n
While Nigeria accounts for 40% of the world\u2019s supply of the crop, it contributes to just 1% of the $6.5-billion global market share in shea products, according to the vice president.<\/p>\n
The measure came weeks after the northern Niger state opened a shea butter processing plant that officials described as one of Africa\u2019s largest.<\/p>\n
Authorities said that if the export ban remains in force, it is expected to generate $300 million in the short term and $3 billion by 2027.<\/p>\n
Experts have argued that such efforts must come with more investment to grow domestic industries.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe ban seems to suggest that the government has identified a supply-gap issue, but an export ban does little actually to lock in current in-country production solely for Nigerian processors,\u201d Ikemesit Effiong, a partner at SBM Intelligence, a Lagos-based risk advisory firm, told The Associated Press.<\/p>\n
The move appeared to contradict the long-standing trade policy of Nigeria’s President Bola Tinubu, who has positioned the country as a free-market economy by removing a series of subsidies on essential commodities such as fuel and electricity. Tinubu has also floated the country’s currency and reversed a ban on the import of dozens of items by the former government.<\/p>\n
Ope Adetayo, The Associated Press<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"LAGOS, Nigeria (AP) \u2014 Nigeria’s government has banned the export of raw shea nuts, an essential raw material…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":104401,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[59829,45,49,48,59823,46,59828,59824,59822,59821,59826,5687,59820,59827,59825],"class_list":{"0":"post-104400","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-economy","8":"tag-bola-tinubu","9":"tag-business","10":"tag-ca","11":"tag-canada","12":"tag-cosmetic-products","13":"tag-economy","14":"tag-export-ban","15":"tag-global-supplier","16":"tag-kashim-shettima","17":"tag-lagos","18":"tag-manufacturing-products","19":"tag-nigeria","20":"tag-shea-butter","21":"tag-shea-nuts","22":"tag-skincare-ingredients"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104400","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=104400"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/104400\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/104401"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=104400"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=104400"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=104400"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}