Reported by: Ijeoma G | Edited by: Oravbiere Osayomore Promise.
The Nigeria Customs Service (NCS) has intensified efforts to curb the illegal importation of vegetable oil, recording a total of 88 seizures between 2025 and 2026 with a combined Duty Paid Value (DPV) of approximately N1.314 billion. The seizures form the backdrop of a new intelligence-driven crackdown designed to protect local investments, preserve thousands of jobs and defend the country's agricultural value chain, the service announced on June 10, 2026.
Speaking during a high-level stakeholders' meeting at the NCS headquarters in Maitama, Abuja, the Comptroller-General of Customs, Adewale Adeniyi, said the fight against vegetable oil smuggling had entered a new, more aggressive phase. He noted that customs field operatives had in recent months intercepted significant consignments of illegal vegetable oil along key border corridors, including the Seme and Idiroko frontiers, delivering a major blow to the financial infrastructure of smuggling cartels.
“Fighting smuggling is a continuous process that requires intelligence, policy support and collaboration,” Adeniyi told representatives of the vegetable oil industry. “We value constructive engagement with stakeholders and will continue to strengthen our partnership with the private sector.” He emphasised that tackling smuggling effectively requires continuous cooperation between government agencies and the private sector, particularly in sectors that contribute significantly to employment generation and national development. He called on stakeholders to support the service’s enforcement efforts by providing credible intelligence on smuggling routes and illicit trade activities.
Providing a detailed operational update, the Deputy Comptroller-General in charge of Enforcement, Inspection and Investigation, Timi Bomodi, disclosed that the NCS recorded 65 seizures of vegetable oil products in 2025 and an additional 23 seizures in 2026. Combined, the two years of enforcement yielded 88 interceptions with a cumulative Duty Paid Value of about N1.314 billion. Bomodi revealed that heightened surveillance along key international trade corridors had already yielded massive seizures and that maritime and land surveillance would be intensified across all vulnerable coastal locations.
Leading the industry delegation, the Founder of the Plantation Owners Forum of Nigeria, Dr. Fatai Afolabi, commended the NCS for creating a platform for dialogue, but warned that the domestic market remains fragile due to unfair foreign competition. “Smuggling of vegetable oil will undermine local production, discouraging investment and threatening thousands of jobs across the value chain,” Afolabi stated. He urged the service to sustain its aggressive border sweeps to prevent the collapse of local oil palm plantations.
The smuggling crackdown comes as Nigeria struggles to protect its agricultural sector from cheap, illegally imported substitutes that undercut domestic producers. The NCS’s latest announcement signals a determined shift from sporadic interception to a sustained, intelligence‑led campaign designed to starve smuggling networks of the cover they have long enjoyed along the country’s porous borders. For local oil palm producers who have watched their market shrink year after year, the message from the Customs leadership is clear: the era of looking the other way has ended.
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