As part of its ongoing consultations wit stakeholders, the Nigeria Institute of Freight Forwarders and Customs Brokers (NIFFCB) is set to brainstorm with the Nigerian Shippers’ Council (NSC) on capacity building and manpower development for practitioners in the freight forwarding sub sector of the maritime industry this week.
The NIFFCB national president Dr. Zebulon Ikokide in a chat with journalists last week disclosed that the proposed meeting with the council is in line with the objectives of ensuring that the institute becomes a professional body.
According to him, issues to be addressed at the meeting will centre around the problems faced by freight forwarding practitioners especially in the area of manpower development, as well as plans to acquire a new training centre and funding.
"We want to have a good office and a befitting training centre for the practitioners; which is the reason behind the visit to the Nigerian Shippers Council"
"Again the Council for the Regulation of Freight Forwarding in Nigeria (CRFFN) has also promised to support us and after our discussion with the Shippers’ Council, we will be expecting the federal government to support us to have a befitting secretariat where we shall be having our training”, he stated.
Ikokide said at the moment, the institute is using rented apartments for its training programmes, but he expressed optimism that, meeting the shippers’ council and others might bring about acquisition of a permanent secretariat.
According to him, freight forwarding practice is not an all-comers affair and that this is the reason behind the institute’s quest to train practitioners for the purpose of becoming professionals in the logistics, shipping and transport sub sector of the economy.
The institute’s president said that, as the official training arm of CRFFN, there is the need for all freight forwarding association to rally round it.
He also called on all maritime government agencies to assist the institute in the area of funding because according to him, it is in the larger interest of the industry.
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