The decline in cargo importation has extensively affected internal freight services along Nigeria’s waterways as barge services dropped by 84.3 per cent in the last three years.

Findings revealed that importers paid a total of N379.3 billion on 948,290 Twenty Equivalent Units (TEUs) lifted by barges from Nigeria Ports within three years.

Service providers under the umbrella of Barge Operators Association of Nigeria (BOAN) charge importers N300,000 to N400,000 to move a container from the port to its destination, while paying over N150,000 charges to terminal operators out of the amount before the goods are ferried out of the port.

vealed that in 2020, barge operators ferried 750, 000 TEUs, 2022, 80, 244 TEUs and 2023 118, 046 TEUs. Among other requirements, NPA alone has put in place a bond requirement of N50 million for barges operating within Lagos Pilotage District; N150 million for those operating across the port, and N250 million for those operating across the borders.

Also, NIMASA, on its part, requires barge operators to collect debit note from the desk officer in charge of Debit Note for N110,000.00 for a form B1, while N100,000 is charged as registration fee.

The Nigeria Customs Service (NCS)’s Area Controller, Tin Can Island Port Command, Comptroller Dera Nnadi, had said in Lagos at a one-day stakeholders summit organised by the Nigerian Shippers’ Council in Apapa, Lagos on the ‘Role of Nigeria Customs Service in the evacuation of cargo from the seaports to the hinterlands’ that the Federal Government agencies regulating barging activities at the ports included:

Nigerian Ports Authority (NPA) National Inland Waterways Authority (NIWA) and the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA). Nnadi said: “When we initially wrote the memo regarding the evacuation of cargo through the waterways, the idea was to evacuate cargo and ease port congestion due to closed access roads.

However, converting this process into a revenue-making activity is detrimental to trade facilitation. I believe we should focus less on revenuemaking and more on regulation to facilitate cargo evacuation.”

Nnadi stressed that when the memo for the use of waterways evacuation of cargoes was conceived and written, it was with a mindset of easing the traffic gridlock, which had bedeviled the port access roads.

Early in the year, NPA issued new licenses to 24 barge operators to enable them participate in the N500 billion freight business in the port industry.

According to NPA’s Executive Director, Engineering and Technical Services, Ibrahim Abba Umar, the authority is the one chairing the barge licence committee, listing other agencies as NIMASA) and NIWA.

He noted that in 2024 alone, out of the 40 applications received by the authority, 24 licenses were given, 15 licences were ready for collection, adding that nine licences had been collected.

The executive director explained that others had been asked to go back to NIMASA and NIWA to complete their documentations.

Meanwhile, the authority had established some guidelines and regulations that would enable NPA and BOAN to clamp down on illegal barge operators using substandard vessels to lift cargoes as well as some of the operators, who have been operating outside the rules of engagement.

In addition, it has established a joint task force drawn from NIMASA, NIWA and BOAN for safety of barge operations on Nigerian waters and to create opportunities for genuine operators.

Also, in its guidelines, NPA said that barge operators must obtained Certificate of Registry (CoR) from NIMASA and Certificate of Registration from NIWA, noting that operators must obtain insurance certificate and valid NPA Pilot Exemption Certificate (PEC) before they could be permitted to ferry containers to off dock terminals.

Other requirements in the guidelines include provision of Condition Survey Report (CSR), availability of publication or equivalent procedural manuals covering pusher tug/ barge crew, company marine operations manual, local tide tables, harbour master notices to mariners, company contingency plan, company salvage manual, pilotage district information pack, Pilotage Exemption Certificate (PEC).

Also, the authority explained that the vessel must be fitted with the good equipment such as compass, Marine VHF radiotelephone installation, Automatic Identification System (AIS), mobile telephone, a deck logbook or equivalent record on board, passage plan appropriate to the area and service for navigation, safety management, containers for recovered waste, emulsifiers (for deck cleaning only), fixed fendering systems in sound condition and capable of preventing metal-to-metal contact with other vessels among others.

According to NPA, barge operator that contravened any of the provision would have his license withdrawn after two consecutive warning letters on the same issue and would be directed to stop service indefinitely until further notice.