West Africa’s foremost ground handling service provider, National Aviation Handling Company (NAHCO) Aviance, recorded a major first recently as it started the exportation of food items to Europe under its new subsidiary, NAHCO Food and Beverages Limited.
A Release from the Company said it commenced the exportation of fresh pepper after being certified by the Nigeria Agricultural Quarantine Service (NAQS) and after consultation with foreign food standards Agencies.
According to the Release, analysts say the initiative is one that would revolutionalise the way Nigeria’s produce are packaged for foreign markets.
“This feat is first by any major operator at the Airport and comes on the back of aggressive push by the Federal Government for increased export of Nigeria products.
“The new export business by the Company is in conjunction with its appointed partners to export the first batch of the exports consisting of high grade fresh Nigerian pepper.” The Release said.
Group Managing Director/CEO, NACHO Aviance, Indranil Gupta, said this development was coming at a time when quite a number of stakeholders had identified packaging as a major challenge for Nigerian exports.
He disclosed that the Company was doing a lot to assist local producers of agric products in realizing their dreams of exporting quality commodities to markets in Europe, America and Asia.
“We appreciate the hard work some of our farmers put into producing their goods. NAHCO is trying to support them export these products so as to make these efforts more worthwhile for them. It is also a way of generating scarce foreign exchange for the country, Gupta stated.”
Explaining the process which led to the commencement of the food exports, the Senior Business Development Manager, New Business, NAHCO Aviance, Emmanuel Illah, pointed out that the project is part of the firm’s larger expansion strategy driven by three major objectives: Growth, Risk Reduction and Profitability.
Illah noted that the GMD/CEO of the Company, Gupta, drove the initiative and have provided support and technical know-how so far.
He also disclosed plans by the Company to onboard new consignees/offtakers. “The marketing campaign and planned roadshow will take care of this.
“We plan to expand the product range substantially in due course to accommodate the requests from the diaspora markets.”Illah said.
