Fragmented inspection stretches clearance times at TinCan Island port, study finds

Import containers at Nigeria’s TinCan Island Port sit idle for about five days before they are cleared, despite inspections taking only a few hours, according to a new port performance report based on 601 import declarations.

The research, called the Time Release Study (TRS), was conducted in collaboration with key government agencies at Tincan Island Port, one of Nigeria’s busiest seaports, handling over 10 percent of Nigeria’s seaborne trade between November 2023 and September 2024, to understand.

The analysis shows that for 98.7 percent of imports, the time from booking a consignment for examination to physical port exit averaged almost four days. However, eight of the 601 consignments surveyed experienced unusually prolonged clearance periods, which increased the overall average clearance time to nearly five days.

While active clearance activities, including physical examinations, account for only about eight percent of the total timeline, the remaining time is lost to procedural inactivity, poor sequencing, and weak synchronisation between various agencies and port logistics.

In the world of global shipping, the report paints a picture of a port that is operationally fast but systematically slow.

When compared to top-performing ports, TinCan island’s 3.6-day average is a disadvantage.

Neighbours like Lomé in Togo and Dakar in Senegal have moved faster toward Single Window systems, where all agencies talk to each other digitally.

In advanced hubs like Port Said (Egypt) or Tangier-Med (Morocco), the “idle time” is almost zero. Cargo often clears in under 24 hours because the paperwork is finished while the ship is still at sea.

Read also: Customs says port reforms could cut cargo delays 40%, save N3trn annually

At Tincan, the clock often only starts when the container hits the ground, leading to an economic drain. In the 2024 Container Port Performance Index (CPPI), Dakar saw a massive jump in efficiency, leaving many other Sub-Saharan ports behind.

Also, while most cargo moves in 3-4 days, the report’s mention of certain cargo stuck for over 64 days is a red flag for international investors.

But the study shows that active work inspections and assessments typically takes only about five hours. But consignments spend over 90 percent of their total time in the port as idle time due to process gaps and lack of coordination.

There are also systemic drivers of delay. The report identifies several reasons why cargo stays in the port longer than necessary

These include fragmented inspections. It argues that Customs and Other Government Agencies (OGAs) do not share a synchronised schedule, leading to sequential rather than joint inspections.

The manual process is still prevalent, as there is a high reliance on physical examinations, which affect almost all cargo, instead of using Non-Intrusive Inspection (NII) technology like scanning.

Documentation is also still an issue. The study shows that Manual and fragmented processes for issuing delivery orders and dispatching trucks cause significant bottlenecks even after Customs clearance is complete. And the system downtime doesn’t help, as frequent outages of the Nigeria Integrated Customs Information System (NICIS II) continue to delay declaration updates.

“The Time Release Study is not merely a diagnostic tool; it is a strategic policy instrument that enables government to measure performance, identify bottlenecks, reduce transaction costs and enhance transparency across the trade ecosystem,” said Doris Uzoka-Anite, minister of state for finance and chairman of the Nigeria Customs Service board.

“By objectively measuring the time required for goods to move across borders, Nigeria is taking a decisive step towards smarter regulation and data-driven decision making,” she said at the International Customs Day event in Abuja on Monday.

She noted that the point of the TRS is to inform future policy actions and directly support the federal government’s ease of doing business agenda, in addition to “strengthening Nigeria’s competitiveness under the African Continental Free Trade Agreement (AfCFTA).”

“A nation can only fully harness the benefits of global trade when robust and effective trade facilitation measures are firmly in place. In today’s global economy, competitiveness is defined by speed, certainty and compliance, and customs plays a role in all three,” she said.

The report proposes a series of “Fast-Track” solutions focused on a digital-first environment to reduce average clearance times from nearly five days to just two.

The primary interventions include a Joint Inspection Scheduling Platform to synchronise Customs and other government agencies (OGA) checks, a digital system to automate post-clearance logistics like truck appointments, and a significant expansion of scanning technology to replace the current reliance on manual physical examinations for 99 percent of cargo.

It also recommends deep technical and institutional reforms to ensure long-term stability and regional competitiveness.

Key operational upgrades involve harmonising risk management data between agencies and stabilizing IT infrastructure to prevent frequent system downtimes that currently stall declarations.

Strategically, the report calls for the establishment of a dedicated TRS Reform Implementation Task Force to oversee these changes and suggests institutionalizing the TRS as a regular benchmarking activity aligned with national development goals and the AfCFTA roadmap.

The TRS showed the importance of transparency and capacity building to bridge existing knowledge gaps among stakeholders.

Recommended measures include the launch of public performance dashboards for real-time visibility and standardized training programs, such as a “TRS Handbook,” to improve procedural compliance.

Bashir Adeniyi, the comptroller-general of Customs said the findings will clear a path to “reducing cargo dwell time, enhancing inter-agency coordination, and aligning Nigeria’s practices with its commitments under the World Trade Organization (WTO) Trade Facilitation Agreement (TFA).”