Nigeria’s foreign trade balance soared to a surplus of $1.1 billion in Q4 2021 just as export value exceeded import bill for the first time since Q3 2019, representing 8 consecutive quarters of negative trade balance.
This was contained in a data on foreign trade obtained from the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) which indicated that Nigeria’s international trade balance increased significantly from a deficit of $327 million recorded in the previous quarter to $1.1 billion in Q4 2021.
In the same vein, when compared to the corresponding period of the previous year, Nigeria’s trade balance increased by 115% from $7.57 billion deficit recorded in Q4 2020.
Meanwhile, the aggregate trade balance for the year 2021 still lies in the negative region at $6.49 billion, although better than the $21.37 billion negative balance recorded in the preceding year.
A further breakdown of the data from the apex bank, showed that export earnings dropped marginally by 3.5% from $13.42 billion recorded in Q3 2021 to $12.95 billion in Q4 2021, while import bill reduced by 13.8% from $13.74 billion to $11.85 billion in the review period.
This implies that the positive trade balance was driven by a significant decline in import bill rather than an increase in export value.
