‘Lagos International Fair Contributed to Business Development, Collaboration’

Oluchi Chibuzor 

The  Trade Commissioner of Japanese External Trade Organisation, JETRO, Takashi Oku, has said that the recently concluded 2024 Lagos International Trade Fair contributed to business development and collaboration as more Japanese companies participated in this year’s event compared to previous year.

Oku who stated this while addressing newsmen in Lagos, stressed that the fair has contributed to creating more businesses.

According to him, “So this year, reflecting on the economic challenges, we felt that visitors are decreasing compared to last year. But in the middle of the event the number of visitors recovered. But even though the number of visitors is decreasing, I believe some business discussions and prominent contracts are steady. Of course, some companies are still facing challenges, but overall, the participants’ business is very steady. And so, the reason why we felt that this fair contributes to creating business opportunities and collaboration. We are collecting, but this year is basically, as I mentioned, our participants increased compared to last year, but the business discussion is almost the same number as last year.”

He added, “We expect the economy recovery, because economic challenging situation effect on the participants number, I believe, so this is just challenging of Nigeria. But even in this situation, we just try to expect a strong relationship between Japan and Nigeria. 

“So, we know, we understand the current economic situation is very challenging, but even in these circumstances, we can have some certain business dialogue with Nigerian business society. So we want to continuously make an effort to have a concrete business. We are expecting the Nigerian economic situation to improve. And then, on the other hand, we also introduce our goodness to the Nigerian economy, so we hope Japan contributes some improvement to the Nigerian economy,” Oku stated.