Osita Aboloma, Chairman/Chief Executive of National Quality Council (first left), making the presentation
By Felix Khanoba
The Chief Executive of the United Kingdom’s Office for Product Safety and Standards (OPSS), Graham Russell, has praised Nigeria’s strategy for implementing its National Quality Policy (NQP), describing the model as innovative.
Russell made the remarks at the OPSS International Conference 2026, which took place in London from January 27 to 28, 2026, under the theme “Regulation for Growth – Product Regulation in a Digital Age.”
He pointed to Nigeria’s governance framework — anchored by an inter-ministerial body situated within the Presidency and charged with coordinating implementation — as a structure that could serve as a valuable reference point for countries seeking to reinforce their quality infrastructure (QI) pillars through an effective quality policy.
Russell’s comments followed a presentation titled “Innovation and Nigeria’s National Quality Policy,” delivered by the Chairman of the National Quality Council, Osita Aboloma, during a session on “Innovation, Regulatory Delivery and Data Handling.”
In his presentation, Aboloma noted that Nigeria is among a limited number of countries with a clearly defined governance structure dedicated to implementing its approved NQP. He emphasized that the policy opens the quality infrastructure value chain to private sector participation, particularly in product inspection and conformity assessment — areas previously dominated by government institutions and agencies.
He further revealed that through collaboration with the British Standards Institution under the Standards Partnership programme, Nigeria has undertaken a coordinated and prioritized set of interventions to tackle challenges in QI implementation.
According to him, these include sensitization initiatives to deepen understanding of the policy’s role in improving efficiency and focus within government institutions and among key stakeholders, particularly in the private sector; Completion of an NQP Implementation Strategy Matrix targeting priority sectors identified by the Nigeria Export Promotion Council (NEPC), namely cocoa, cashew, leather and its derivatives, as well as tea, designated as pilot projects and development and execution of a communications strategy to support the launch and promotion of the NQP, especially within the private sector.
According to the NQC Chief Executive, these measures have fostered productive engagement with government regulators and organized private sector groups, including small and medium-scale enterprises.
Aboloma stated that one of the most significant deliverables in the NQP implementation in Nigeria so far was the Nigerian National Accreditation System (NiNAS)’s recent achievement of Mutual Recognition Arrangement of the African Accreditation Cooperation (AFRAC) and International Laboratory Accreditation Cooperation (ILAC) as well as the multilateral arrangement of the International Accreditation Forum (IAF).
The achievement according to him has provided Nigeria with a local equivalent of an international trade instrument for trust and integrity in the form of accreditation that is recognized globally, with great prospects for foreign exchange savings and job creation in the quality infrastructure value chain.
The NQC according to him, is in the process of developing a National Technical Regulatory Framework (NATReF) using the approved African Technical Regulatory Framework (ACTReF) as reference material. “When fully operational, the NATReF is expected to significantly improve Nigeria’s technical regulatory space as well as enhance our data handling using digital solutions” he said.
Aboloma stated that these would culminate into Nigeria’s pioneering role in implementing the mutual recognition agreement under the African Continental Free Trade Area Agreement (AfCFTA), an instrument to promote equivalence using conformity assessment as a vehicle across the continent.
