South Africa, Egypt, Benin Republic, Botswana, Namibia, Djibouti and Rwanda are ahead of Nigeria in the latest global Logistics Performance Index (LPI) released by the World Bank.
The LPI is an interactive bench-marking tool created to help countries identify the challenges and opportunities they face in their performance on trade logistics, including shipping and what they can do to improve their performance.
The LPI report, titled “Connecting to Compete 2023: Trade Logistics in an Uncertain Global Economy,” provides a measure of countries’ ability to move goods across borders with speed and reliability, the report is coming after three years of unprecedented supply chain disruptions during the COVID-19 pandemic, with soaring delivery times.
Covering 139 countries, the LPI measured the ease of establishing reliable supply chain connections and the structural factors that make it possible, such as the quality of logistics services, trade, transport-related infrastructure, and border controls.
The report, which is based on a maximum score of 5.0, adjudged South Africa as the best in Africa and 19th in the world with a score of 3.4 per cent, followed by Botswana and Egypt which scored 3.1 per cent each to place a joint 57th position globally.
However, Botswana is better rated than Egypt due to the performance of its Customs.
Benin Republic, which many importers in Nigeria prefer its ports due to logistics convenience and Namibia are on the 66th position while Rwanda on the 73rd spot, and Djibouti (79th) are clearly rated ahead of Nigeria (88th) in the World Bank LPI report.
Nigeria posted 2.6 per cent (Customs); 2.4 per cent on logistics infrastructure, 2.5 per cent on international shipments, 2.3 per cent on logistics competence and quality, 3.1 on timeliness and 2.7 on tracking and tracing.
The Nigeria Customs Service was also rated 90th among the 139 countries, behind their South Africa and Beninoise counterparts ranked at 31st and 65th positions respectively.
According to the Global Director for Trade, Investment, and Competitiveness at the World Bank, Mona Haddad, “Logistics are the lifeblood of international trade, and trade in turn is a powerful force for economic growth and poverty reduction. “The LPI helps developing countries identify where improvements can be made to boost competitiveness.”
