Newsfront Online …Telling the Public as it is
African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank) said it plans to assist Nigeria from the $4 billion Ukraine Crisis Adjustment Trade Financing Programme for Africa (UKAFPA) launched last month.
According to it, the move would help mitigate the impact of the food and fuel crises in the country. President/Chairman of Afreximbank, Prof. Benedict Oramah, made this known at a virtual news conference on the US$4 billion UKAFPA, launched last week, said this is a programme of credit facilities that the bank had developed to manage the impacts of the Ukraine crisis on African economies and businesses.
It was launched as programmed response to an urgent call for emergency intervention by member states of the bank, saying UKAFPA-compliant financing requests received from across Africa exceeds US$15 billion. Oramah said the bank was also expanding its support to Nigeria’s fuel import, in addition to other provisions made earlier by the bank.
He said: “Nigeria is an African Union and Afreximbank member and should be able to access the facility as a member country. “We supported fuel import and we are expanding that because there are urgent needs. There are discussions going on with regards to food also. We are supporting Nigeria. We are living in an unprecedented time. Since two years, the world has been going through major challenges. “The COVID-19 pandemic, which became a global challenge and crisis in the first quarter of 2020, is still raging. Again, early this year, the Ukraine crisis set in. The crisis was magnified by sanctions that had been placed and the fact that the war affects Ukraine in many other ways.”
According to him, Russia and Ukraine were the bread baskets of the world, producing most of the world’s wheat, corn, corn flour, and a number of food items. “he same thing applies to agro-chemical items, especially fertiliser. Africa is very dependent in all these. Many countries in Africa import most of their wheat and fertiliser from Russia and Ukraine.
Tourism arrivals from Russia and Ukraine support economies of many African countries. So,with the war and the sanctions that followed, all of a sudden, all these became threatened. So, the effect has been rising food prices and challenging economic situation. And there is indication that if this continues, the continent might run back into recession.”
(thenationonlineng.net)
