By Derrick Bangura

According to the Republic of Korea, the volume of trade between the country and Nigeria increased to $2 billion last year.

Mr. Kim Young Chae, the Korean Ambassador to Nigeria, revealed this on Thursday during a press conference following the election of Yoon Suk-yeol as South Korea’s President-elect on Wednesday.
He said the bilateral trade figure was a 50 per cent increase in compared to that of 2020. He said the boost in bilateral trade occurred in spite of the COVID-19 pandemic.

“I hope that this year our bilateral trade rises further and at the end of the day I want to see Nigeria become Korea’s biggest trading partner in Africa. Nigeria is the biggest economy in Africa, so it should be Korea’s number trading partner among Africa’s countries,” Kim said.

Presently, Nigeria is Korea’s third biggest trading partner in Africa.
The ambassador said the balance of trade between both countries was driven mainly by Korea’s manufactured goods, like plastic and aluminum related products and Nigeria’s oil and gas.

“We are importing a lot of Nigerian gas to further increase our bilateral trade. Of course oil and gas is very important, but we want to see some agricultural products from Nigeria and manufactured goods in order to penetrate into Korean market.

“I hope more Nigerian companies will study Korean markets and Korean consumers. For example, we import a lot of sesame seed and I know that Nigeria produces a lot of sesame seed. There is a huge potential for Nigeria’s sesame seed or sesame oil,” he said.

He also stated that his country wants Nigeria to back the candidacy of Korean Foreign Affairs Minister, Kyung-wha Kang for the Director-General of the International Labour Organization (ILO) at the election scheduled for Geneva on March 25.

Kim said Kang had met the Chief of Staff to President, Prof Ibrahim Gambari, Minister of Foreign Affairs, Geoffrey Onyeama and NLC President Mr. Ayuba Waba during her visit to the country to campaign and seek Nigeria’s backing for her candidacy.

Meanwhile, the Republic of Korea has called on Nigeria to fulfill her commitments and support the set objectives of the $13 million Digital Governance Programme.

Speaking during the recently conducted two-week pre-kick-off survey for the project titled: “Project for Building Foundations Towards Digital Governance in Nigeria (2021~2026),” the KOICA Nigeria Country Director, Mr. Sungil Son said engagements with government stakeholders was focused on the need to have all commitments from the Nigerian government.

The Republic of Korea through its grant aid agency, Korea International Cooperation Agency (KOICA) Office in Nigeria in collaboration with the Federal Ministry of Communications and Digital Economy (FMCDE) recently conducted a 2-week pre-kick-off survey for the project.

The project is expected to enhance Nigeria’s e-Government implementation system through the update of the current Nigeria’s e-Government Master Plan (NeGMP), upgrade of Nigeria’s Enterprise Architecture and development of a 10-year eGovernment Implementation Plan.

Other objectives of the project includes improvement in competencies for e-Government service delivery through capacity building programs designed for policy makers and technical officers at both federal and state levels of government, enhancement of the quality of government digital services through the activation of the Government Service Portal www.services.gov.ng and create increased access for NIN enrolment through the establishment of additional NIN enrolment units.

A statement from KOICA yesterday, disclosed that during the survey, an initial 3-member Project Management Consultant (PMC) team led by the Project Manager, Prof. Hung-Kook Park from Sangmyung University and KOICA Nigeria Country Director, Mr. Sungil Son, had detailed technical and high-level engagements with representatives of key project stakeholders namely; Federal Ministry of Communications and Digital Economy (FMCDE), National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA), Galaxy Backbone (GBB), National Identity Management Commission (NIMC), United Nations Children’s Education Fund (UNICEF), and National Population Commission (NPC).

A major highlight of the survey activity was the hosting of the wrap-up meeting with project stakeholders at the e-Government Training Centre (eGTC) in Abuja.