Helen Grant is a Member of Parliament for Maidstone and The Weald and Prime Minister’s Trade Envoy to Nigeria. In this interview with BusinessDay’s Endurance Okafor, Grant shares insight on how she will leverage her new position as the second Trade Envoy to Nigeria to strengthen the UK-Nigerian relationship for mutual prosperity, trade and investment. Excerpt:
As the UK Trade Envoy to Nigeria, how do you plan to strengthen the UK–Nigerian relationship for mutual prosperity?
With a Nigerian father and an English mother, I am blessed with the benefit of a rich dual heritage and a deep understanding of these two complex and complimentary cultures.
Prior to entering politics, I ran my own successful legal practice for many years, a career that gave me a solid grounding as an entrepreneur, a manager, a negotiator and a professional. Working alongside the whole team at the DIT and the FCDO I hope the skills I acquired as a lawyer, a businesswoman and a politician, together with my empathy for the special and sensitive nuances of our two countries will help us all bring about the maximum in terms of bilateral commerce.
We already have so much that unites us through our language, our legal systems, our time zones – and our football! With a concerted effort from all parties, I believe the sky is the limit on future trade and investment between us.
What are some of the things you plan to achieve with your new position?
I want to illuminate the diversity and potential of Nigeria’s economy to British companies. Oil and gas are important, but other sectors account for more than 90 percent of Nigeria’s GDP, with services accounting for more than half of the economy and agriculture being the largest employer here.
Indeed, one of the first meetings I had when appointed as the Prime Minister’s Trade Envoy was with a Nigerian agricultural company looking to partner with a UK farming specialist to help grow their business. Developing partnerships between UK and Nigerian businesses in the agricultural sector will continue to be an absolute focus for me.
Nigeria is already the UK’s second-largest market in Africa, with nearly £5 billion of trade, and UK companies here employ tens of thousands in sectors as diverse as financial services, consumer goods manufacturing, food and drink, and waste management services. But I want to travel the country as far as I can, to seek more opportunities to link UK businesses with Nigerian partners and help drive the diversification agenda which I know is a priority for President Buhari.
Another important focus of activity is with Nigeria’s diaspora in the UK. They play a significant role in bilateral trade and investment and I am already in discussions with our Minister for Africa James Duddridge about how the UK Government can do more to harness these unique links.
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And I especially want to help develop opportunities for women in business and promote gender equality, something I have been passionate about for most of my life. In the 2019 London Stock Exchange Group report on Companies to Inspire Africa, over a quarter of the featured firms were Nigerian. 22 percent of those 97 companies are led by women and so, I say, let’s bring British and Nigerian women entrepreneurs together and see what can be achieved.
As the second Trade Envoy to Nigeria, what is your take on the potential for trade and investment in the country with the most population in Africa?
Potential for UK companies in Africa’s largest market has never been greater and the country is proving itself to be open for business with a range of measures. Nigeria deserves credit for removing fuel subsidies and tackling electricity tariffs, to attract investment to the power sector and the granting of new licences for Payment Service Banks creates a welcome expansion of access to mobile money. Further, the Federal Government has committed to making customs clearance easier for businesses via the “Single Window” portal; that would make the clearing of exports and imports so much easier. The UK is providing technical assistance on this project.
UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson said at the UK-Africa Investment Summit in London that the UK wants to be the investment partner of choice for Africa. What should Africa, especially Nigeria, expect in terms of investment?
I very much enjoyed participating in the first UK-Africa Investment Summit in January 2020, joining with the Prime Minister and 16 African Heads of State in London.
Bringing new investment into the country remains a long-term priority from a UK standpoint and I am playing my part in helping to attract investors. At the summit, I chaired a panel discussion with leading business figures who already trade successfully in Africa. There was optimism from all quarters about improvements in the ease of doing business, breaking down barriers to trade across the continent and combating corruption with transparency and technology. I also moderated a presidential panel at the summit which focussed on the need for clean energy to power economic growth whilst mitigating carbon footprints.
After the Summit, I am proud to say that the UK announced 27 trade and investment deals worth £6.5bn.
What sectors of the Nigerian economy seem more attractive to the UK for trade and investment?
I’m keen to help companies regardless of the sector but it does make sense to identify sectors where demand is strong and where Nigeria’s federal and state governments have identified priorities. Agriculture is one example. Power sector investment is another and UK companies are already active in power generation and distribution projects in states as diverse as Bauchi, Kaduna and Ogun.
As home to the largest number of tech unicorns in Europe, the UK should be a natural partner for Nigerian tech start-ups, which already makes a bigger contribution to the economy than oil, and the UK has a competitive advantage in sectors such as financial and professional services and infrastructure. We can match demands for capital and investment in Nigeria with deep and sophisticated markets in the City of London.
With the Nigerian economy currently in recession, how do you see the partnership with the UK helping to grow Africa’s largest economy away from contraction?
Through the pandemic the UK has supported Nigeria to mitigate the impact by adapting its existing economic development programmes. Early support by the UK-funded Manufacturing Africa programme assisted the private sector to produce PPE locally. I know some UK companies in Nigeria also switched to manufacturing key products such as hand sanitiser.
For the longer term, the UK is supporting the Economic Sustainability Plan’s 5 million off-grid solar connections project, through grants to help solar companies, technical assistance to quality accreditation centres and assessing whether customs tariffs could be reformed for solar products.
UKAid programmes, ranging from providing finance through infrastructure to agriculture and tech, provide a rich and wide range of technical assistance. The UK has supported 2m jobs and incomes increased in Nigeria in the last four years – that’s 39 percent of jobs from UKAid programmes globally!
The UK is working with the Federal Government to make it easier for non-oil companies from Nigeria to export, such as helping companies comply with the standards and regulations for exporting products to the UK. There are some great products that I would love to see on UK supermarket shelves, such as Cassa Nova cassava crisps and Loshes chocolates.
Climate change already threatens Nigeria’s economic well-being. In just under a year, the UK will host COP 26 and ahead of that important moment the UK is working in partnership with the Nigerian government to promote: a clean energy transition, with nature-based solutions, sustainable agriculture, adaptation and resilience and to bring more climate finance to Nigeria.
How do you think the UK-Nigeria trade partnership can also contribute to the growth of the UK economy?
I want to see more UK companies exporting to the growth markets of the future and Nigeria is absolutely key to our success. High value-added UK manufacturers are one sector already successfully doing business in Nigeria; Lagos’ solar-powered, energy-efficient street lighting, made in the UK, is but one example
And as a lawyer, I’m particularly keen to support trade in financial, legal and professional services, given their importance to both economies. I co-chair a bilateral working group looking at boosting trade in legal services and greater collaboration between law professionals in both countries, for our mutual benefit.
Having served as a Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Justice and for Women and Equalities, how do you plan to solve issues around diversity, inclusion, equality, social cohesion, racism and women empowerment, especially in relation to trade in Nigeria?
Promoting equality, diversity and inclusion goes to the heart of my politics and indeed my persona. It is not only right for society, but those businesses who espouse these principles perform better than their competitors. We still have much work to do in the UK, but we are seeing progress and I am encouraged. The raft of evidence is weighty and persuasive and sharing this with Nigeria in business, government and the public sector is part and parcel of my role.
Earlier I mentioned my passion for empowering women in business and during the UK-Africa Investment Summit last January, I met some truly inspiring Nigerian Female Tech Founders who have been supported and mentored by the UK’s tech hub. I think by supporting female entrepreneurs to grow their concepts into businesses we can make huge strides in terms of female empowerment and diversity.
During my time as UK Trade Envoy to Nigeria, I will not only seek to support businesses to deliver their bottom line but also use the role as a force for social good. For me, the two are inextricably linked.
