Director Mojisola Adeyeye of the National Agency for Food and Drugs Administration and Control (NAFDAC) stated that the organisation has spent more than N6 billion of its own internal funds over the past eight years building the infrastructure required to enable international trade in Nigerian pharmaceuticals.
Adeyeye stated at BusinessDay’s policy intervention series focused on NAFDAC as an agency for economic development and transformation that the agency, in a broad restructuring of strategies to discharge its function, has used this fund on the expansion of its laboratory capacity across the nation, putting it on track to achieve the World Health Organisation Maturity Level (ML4) and the World Listed Authority Status by 2025.
It is anticipated that Nigerian medical items will become more competitive in international trade if they receive higher worldwide ratings. Global organisations will be more inclined to trust you as a result, which will motivate them to buy these items for their interventions.
Adeyeye stated that UNICEF used over 600,000 cartons of locally manufactured, ready-to-use therapeutic food that were inspected by NAFDAC in 2023, a considerable increase from less than 100,000 as of 2018. Adeyeye cited UNICEF’s purchase pattern in Nigeria.
“Economically, when we have worldwide authority, medical products approved after that date can be traded over the world. “That is how important quality is to economic development,” Adeyeye stated.
More than 20 recently registered local drug manufacturers, representing a 12% increase in the number of active local FPP manufacturers, have finished setting up WHO-compliant facilities that produce important medications of high quality for Nigerians, according to her.
According to the DG, as of February 2024, 143 applications for regulatory evaluation and approval of new pharma layouts intended for local pharmaceutical manufacturing had been submitted. Of those, 73% had gotten regulatory approval to start building.
However, she pointed out that just 35 percent of the 105 individuals who received this approval have finished and are in various phases of registration, indicating that the devaluation of the naira has hampered the majority of them.
Adeyeye highlighted other steps being taken to facilitate business dealings and set a global standard, pointing out that the agency is now working on eight new building construction projects in the states of Oyo, Ondo, Rivers, Imo, Akwa-Ibom, Anambra, and Bauchi.
The agency is working on 26 projects in total, including the eight new ones, with four having been commissioned, five having been finished, and nine still in progress, according to the DG.
The projects that have been put into service are the import and export division of NAHCO in Ogun, Osun, Kwara, Lagos; the completed projects in Ebonyi, Yobe, Abuja, and the Yaba laboratory in Lagos; and the ongoing projects in Sokoto, Kebbi, Zamfara, Plateau, Edo, Delta, and Enugu states, which include the vaccine laboratory and the renovation of the NAFDAC office complex in Isolo, Lagos state.
She went on to say that the public’s incapacity to obtain agency information was caused by the continuous reactivation of information communication technology, including hardware and software, as well as the digitalization of regulatory operations.
“We started rebuilding our bad website so users could see as much information as possible,” the spokesperson stated.
She added that there is a continuous process on to obtain more than 140 automobiles for regulatory inspection.
“It (NAFDAC) has started building infrastructure development (state offices and laboratories) – ongoing,” she stated.
Speaking of the agency’s accomplishments since taking office, Adeyeye stated that coordinating directorship had streamlined report lines. She also mentioned that, at the time of her arrival in Lagos, food regulations were exclusive to the city but had since been decentralised to facilitate commercial dealings.
The agency’s leadership was reorganised, and “a disciplined and motivated workforce” was also established.
She also mentioned that the organisation intends to open desk offices in each of the nation’s 774 local government districts.
Our goal is to establish NAFDAC desk offices in 774 local government entities. We’ve restricted it to having senatorial districts with at least three NAFDAC counters, she said.
Speaking about trade and market control, the DG stated that the agency is in charge of market control for its regulated products. The agency’s primary responsibilities include “controlling import and export activities, market surveillance / monitoring quality and safety of regulated products throughout the value chain and trade-related matters,” as well as “prevention and detection of, and response to SFs in the market.”
Others include maintaining effective and efficient control at these channels and making sure that the numerous airports, seaports, and land borders comply with legal criteria.
