The Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) has generated N172.3 billion from its operations in the first half of 2022 and remitted N78.5bn to the Consolidated Revenue Fund (CRF).
These disclosures were contained in a half-year 2022 operational report released by the Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Mr. Mohammed Bello Koko.
A breakdown of the figure indicates that N50.3bn represents cash remittances, the compulsory deduction of 25% of revenue generated and other sundry payments for the absolute period of January-June 2022.
Koko said: “The remaining sum of N28.2bn relates to the remittance with respect to other periods.”
He further explained that, in the face of global economic and inflation crises, the half-year operational statistics were encouraging, adding that they had bolstered impressive remittances to the CRF of the federal government.
Koko said: “Global economic and inflation crises, global reduction in household incomes and purchasing power and scarcity of foreign exchange all of which have negatively affected business environment, affected government revenue and constrained expenditure.
“In the face of these harsh macro-economic indices, the NPA has forged on to deliver port and harbour services to the teeming operators in the export and import businesses across the country.”
The NPA boss explained that the remittances were expressions of the operational performance of the ports.
According to him: “In the 1st half of 2022, a total of 1,992 ship calls were recorded and the aggregate of the Gross Registered Tonnage (GRT) of vessels was 60,235,133 tons.
“The authority achieved total cargo throughput of 38,672,392 metric tonnes and 849,175 TEUs (twenty-foot equivalent units) of container traffic. Vehicle traffic handled, during the period under review, was 132,543 units.
“Also, the average turn-around-time (TAT) of vessels, indicating port efficiency, stood at 5.16days. This is an improvement and we are strategizng to perform better in the second half of the year.”
Koko said that it was important to note that “Port remains the gateway of the national economy, and thus represents the barometer by which we measure the pulse of the economy.
“The authority remains committed to providing improved services to increase efficiency at the ports that impact on higher revenue generation and economic growth of the nation.”
