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Economic Hardship: We Won’t Compromise Quality Of Products
The National Agency For Food And Drug Administration And Control (NAFDAC) has said safe, standard quality of regulated products would not be compromised in spite of the prevailing economy of the country.
Mrs Roseline Ajayi, NAFDAC South-West Coordinator, made the pledge during a one-day stakeholders interactive meeting organised by the agency yesterday in Akure.
Ajayi said that the Director General, Prof. Mojisola Adeleye, had introduced some measures as intervention to ease the burden on the agency’s stakeholders.
“It is a call on all stakeholders operating in the regulatory space to embrace and confront the dynamic nature of the business environment with a view to exploring the opportunities inherent in the challenges.
“It is a statement of fact that the business environment is experiencing several challenges including subsidy removal, unpredictable exchange rates, unstable power supply and other issues threatening business sustainability.
“However, those engaged in NAFDAC regulated products must come to the understanding that safety, standard and quality are not negotiable.
“And because of economic hardship, our D-G has opened a window of three months administrative charges waivers for late renewal of license of the stakeholders from January to end of March,” she said.
According to her, anybody caught selling or producing unregistered products would be penalised with administrative charges
Ajayi also said that the stakeholders meeting was in line with the directives of the NAFDAC director-general to engage with the different sectors of stakeholders.
“The purpose of this meeting is aimed at safeguarding the health of the nation.
”We want to ensure that only the right quality and safe products are made available for the consumers in the country because it’s unauthorised and a violation of the law for anybody to produce unhealthy products,” she said.
Ajayi also advised Nigerians to patronise only registered products, either imported or locally made, for their health benefits.
“Let our consumers be careful of what they are consuming and stop patronising products without NAFDAC registration numbers.
“If you continue to patronise them, you are as well encouraging them to do more, but without you patronising them, they will go out of the business,” Ajayi said.
Also, Mr Charles Uwachukwu, a director in the agency’s office in Lagos, enjoined producers to be mindful of what they produce for human consumption in the country.
“Don’t adulterate your products because your are serving your people not animals.
“And if you cannot take what you are producing, there is no reason for you to produce or go into any productions.
“Don’t produce what will jeopardise our health.
“If your are a supermarket owner and you go and validate your product, the law will catch you,” he said.
One of the participants, Mr Mapay Rotimi, Chairman, Association of Table Water Producers (ATWAP), Akure zone, appreciated the NAFDAC DG for the three months licence waivers.
He also appealed to the agency to regulate issuance of licence to the water producers in the state.
“In the two local government which comprises Akure zone, about 150 water producers are given licenses
“And in the process of competing with one another, some of us might be tempted to reduce the quality in order to push their products into the market.
“So, it is our concern that NAFDAC issuance of licenses should be strict,” Rotimi said.
Nigerians may experience an increase in the prices of premium energy products diesel and petrol as the Dangote Petroleum Refinery temporarily halts the sale of petroleum products in Naira.
“This decision is necessary to avoid a mismatch between our sales proceeds and our crude oil purchase obligations, which are currently denominated in US dollars,” the company said in a statement yesterday.
The $20billion refinery based in Lagos said the sales of its products in Naira have exceeded the value of Naira-denominated crude it has received from the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL).
“As a result, we must temporarily adjust our sales currency to align with our crude procurement currency,” the company explained.
The refinery said it remained committed to serving the Nigerian market and would resume the sale of its product to the local market in Naira as soon as it received crude cargoes from the NNPCL in Naira.
“As soon as we receive an allocation of Naira-denominated crude cargoes from NNPC, we will promptly resume petroleum product sales in Naira,” it said.
The announcement by the refinery comes amid its price war with the NNPCL.
As part of moves to reduce the strain on the US dollars, and guarantee price stability of petroleum products, the Federal Executive Council (FEC) in July 2024, directed the NNPCL to sell crude oil to Dangote Refinery and other local refineries in naira and not in United States’ greenback.
In the beginning of March 2025, the NNPCL said its Naira-denominated crude sales agreement with the Dangote Refinery was structured for six months with March 2025 as the expiration date.
The state company, however, said that talks were on to replace the contract, and that over 48 million barrels of crude oil have been made available to Dangote Refinery since October 2024 under the Naira-denominated arrangement.
The NNPCL also said it had made over 84 million barrels of crude oil available to the private refinery since it commenced operations in 2023.
Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation, faces energy challenges, with all its state-owned refineries non-operational for decades until 2024. The country was heavily reliant on imported refined petroleum products, with the state-run NNPCL being the major importer of the essential commodities.
Fuel queues are commonplace in the country. Prices of petrol more than quadrupled since the removal of subsidy in May 2023 by President Bola Tinubu, from around ¦ 200/litre to about ¦ 1,000/litre, compounding the woes of the citizens who power their vehicles, and generating sets with petrol, no thanks to decades-long epileptic electricity supply.
Last December, the billionaire industrialist commenced operations at the facility situated in Lagos with 350,000 barrels a day. The refinery, which was initially bogged by regulatory battles, hopes to achieve its full capacity of 650,000 barrels per day by the end of the year. The refinery has begun the supply of diesel and aviation fuel to marketers in the country and now petrol.
Nigeria’s Quadri Aruna has overtaken Egypt’s Omar Assar to become Africa’s highest-ranked player in the world, now sitting at 18th in the week 12 ranking released on Tuesday.
Aruna moved up from 19th place in week 11 to 18th in the latest ranking, while Assar dropped from 17th to 19th.
Denmark’s Jonathan Groth took over Assar’s 17th place, moving up from 18th.
Despite finishing as runner-up at the 2025 ITTF Africa Cup, Aruna’s impressive performances at the WTT tournaments this year have boosted his ranking.
Aruna remains the only African male player to have reached the semi-finals of the WTT Contender Doha, repeating his 2023 feat earlier this year in January.
This achievement has propelled him ahead of Assar, who beat him to become the champion of the 2025 ITTF Africa Cup.
Aruna’s next tournament is the WTT Contender Chennai which serves off in India from March 23 to 20.
In the women’s singles, Egypt’s Hana Goda maintained her top spot in Africa, moving up one place to 26th in the week 12 ITTF ranking. Her compatriot, Dina Meshref, remained static at 33rd, holding her position as the second-best-ranked female player in Africa.
China’s Wang Chuqin retained his position as the second-best player globally, behind his compatriot Lin Shidong, who continues to hold the top spot. Japanese superstar Tomokazu Harimoto dethroned China’s Liang Jingkun as the third-best player in the world after his semifinal finish in Chongqing.
In the women’s ranking, the top five remained unchanged, with China’s Sun Yingsha holding onto her top spot after retaining her WTT Champions Chongqing title.
