Director, Centre for the Promotion of Private Enterprise (CPPE), Dr Muda Yusuf, has commended the recent Executive Order removing import duties, Valued-Added Tax (VAT), and excise duty on pharmaceutical raw materials, intermediate products, medical diagnostic equipment and machineries.     
 
Stressing that fiscal policy measures have much better prospects of addressing supply side challenges in the economy, if well targeted, he said boosting production is very vital to fixing the current inflationary pressures, driven largely by supply side challenges in the economy.   
   
These fiscal policy measures he reiterated, would boost domestic production of pharmaceutical products, reduce medications cost, improve access to healthcare and impact positively on the well-being of citizens. He added that it would also revitalise the country’s pharmaceutical industries and create more jobs.
   
He went on to recommend that these fiscal policy measures be replicated to boost production in other segments of the real sector, including agriculture, agrochemicals and the agro-allied industries to curb the surging food inflation.

He added that similar intervention is also needed in the energy sector, to promote energy security and incentivise private investments in the sector; as well as the iron and steel sector to aid the construction industry and reduce construction costs for housing and infrastructure. 
   
“We also need fiscal policy protection to support domestic investments in petroleum refineries to conserve FX, create jobs and deepen backward integration. There is a groundswell of economic nationalism globally and we should respond by strengthening our domestic production capabilities across all sectors. Fiscal policy measures have proven to be more impactful on real sector performance than monetary policy,” he said.
   
He also commended the Central Bank for scrapping its Price Verification System Portal which he said was a needless duplication of the functions of the Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) and a product of a dysfunctional FX regime.
   
He went on to urge the government to ensure effective implementation of Executive Orders 003 and 005, saying a policy can only be as good as its implementation. “These executive orders have been flagrantly violated overtime without consequences and we appeal to the presidency to ensure compliance by the MDAs with these executive orders in the spirit of current efforts to boost domestic production, grow domestic talents and reform the economy,” he concluded.

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