The Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Godwin Emefiele, has revealed that in the second quarter of implementing the RT200 FX programme for exports worth $600m, the apex bank paid eligible exporters over N20bn rebates.
He made the revelation during a press briefing after the Monetary Policy Committee meeting on Tuesday in Lagos state.
Emefiele said, “We are delighted that the race to $200bn is yielding good result under the RT200 programme because in the data that we have so far, we found out that we have received inflow as at June this year of over $2.9bn.
“And we all know that in the first quarter when we started, we disbursed N3.6bn as rebate for those who have conducted export activities. For quarter two, we have this morning, just approved the release and payment and rebate to those who conducted export activities to the tune of N20bn for quarter two.
“You can see a jump from N3.6bn in quarter one to N20bn in quarter two because whereas we found out that, yes there has been a lot of exports, those exports that were found to be eligible for the reason were in the tune of over $600m and that is the reason why we are paying slightly over N20bn in the second quarter.
“Exports in earnings are increasing and we have calculated that at some point, we will get to a point that the banks will not even need to come to the CBN to buy foreign exchange for the need of their customers.
“We are delighted that we are moving gradually in that direction and this number will improve by the end of the year.”
In February, Emefiele, after a meeting with the Bankers’ Committee, announced the RT200 FX Programme to boost forex supply in the country through the non-oil sector in the next three to five years.
He explained that the RT200 FX Programme was “a set of policies, plans and programmes for non-oil exports that would enable the country attain $200bn goal in FX repatriation, exclusively from non-oil exports.”
