National Single Window cuts SON migration issues by 60%

Processes initiated by the National Single Window team to address importers affected by the data migration process with the Standard Organisation of Nigeria have led to over a 60 per cent reduction in SON-related migration issues within four weeks, The PUNCH reports.

The Director of Operations at the NSW Secretariat, Mr Peter Ekundayo, disclosed this over the weekend in Lagos during a chat with journalists on the achievements of the platform within the last eight weeks.

He admitted that though there was a migration challenge at the initial stage of the process, it has reduced drastically.

Ekundayo added that the NSW platform has entered into the stage he described as the learning curve, among others.

The director explained that in the early stage, the team observed a situation where some data were absolutely missing, adding that there were also cases where the team could not reconcile some of the data gotten from the agency with international partners, which created some delay.

Ekundayo stressed that those few weeks, especially the first week precisely, were chaotic.

He highlighted that the team got a grip on the data migration, cleaned it up, and started migrating it over a period but realised that because of the increasing pressure on approvals, “we needed to figure out a way to provide some grace period for the importers that were affected by the missing data and the data migration so that they can have some kind of default, which is like a temporary approach to clear that consignment. Because they have already applied for those product certificates or shipment certificates and we could not delay them further.”

According to him, the team kick-started the process four weeks ago and completed it, stressing that upon completing the process, a two-week window was given.

“But when we reviewed it last week, we realised that most of the backlog of some migration issues had been resolved. So, the cases we have seen in the help desk for SON-related migration issues also have reduced significantly by over 60 per cent, and what we are treating now is more related to the learning curve, knowledge gap, understanding what to attach and how to manage that. So, SON is significantly under check,” Ekundayo said.

He said that the team has met with the SON management, who expressed happiness with the collaboration.

Ekundayo, however, noted that the process is progressing differently with the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control.

“Firstly, if you recall, last year in December, NAFDAC had a problem with their own software internally, and then that system was accumulating backlogs in terms of approvals. Now, that transitioned into the single window. If you recall, in January or February, there was an announcement by the Federal Government that NAFDAC should extend the permits they gave last year into this year for a couple of months just to allow for the pharmaceuticals and all the critical order inputs to be met. So migrating into the single window with NAFDAC, the backlogs are still being carried on,” he explained.

Ekundayo maintained that there is an increase in the number of applications on the NSW portal.

“Like we see now, a lot more compliance is happening, so that has increased the number of applications, and they have not increased their number of resources or staff. So, the team is under pressure,” he said.

He said that the team is working with NAFDAC to ensure that the approval process is passed: “So we are working with them to ensure that NAFDAC issues will also be resolved over the next two to four weeks and get back to us.”

He added that since inception, the help desk has seen 9,800 issues.

“But in total, as a help desk, we have seen 9,800 issues since inception. In the first four weeks, the majority of those issues occurred, more than 6,000. We were having an average of 1,500 issues per week. In the last four weeks, we have seen those daily or weekly issues decline from 1,500 to less than 900, 800 in some cases,” he stated.

He emphasised that all the issues have been resolved “with the exception of 135, so it is a 99 per cent resolution.”