Following the down turn in the international price of crude oil and its effect on oil dependent economy like Nigeria, the Nigeria president, Muhammadu Buhari has reaffirmed his administration’s commitment to foster development of non-oil sectors and the speedy diversification of the country’s economy. Reacting to the president’s plan, experts have continued to urge the president to focus on Trade and Commerce[RA1] and how technology can be used to drive it.
Trade and Commerce is fast becoming an indispensable component of the non-oil sector of the Nigerian economy. The Wholesale and Retail space for instance currently accounts for about $100 billion. This according to a McKinsey report has a potential of increasing to $300 billion by 2030.
Speaking on how the growth in Trade and Commerce can be enhanced for national growth, the Media spokesperson of Supermart.ng, Oluwatayo Alofun noted that there is need to create an atmosphere for buyers to buy more and sellers to sell more. He noted that when sellers are able to make more sales it leads to business expansion which automatically creates room for more employments and also contribute to national growth.
According to him, “the current traditional Wholesale and Retail business as we have it today is generally unorganized. What e-commerce companies like Supermart.ng has done however is to organize the market such that consumers can get everything they want in just one spot. This makes them to buy more. This explains why supermart.ng has partnered with leading supermarkets and local markets to put up a one stop shop online with over 60,000 items including Fresh food, foreign products, Nigerian ingredients, general groceries and baby products among others which will be delivered to buyers in as early as three hours of order”
In order for this to be possible, a chain of different job roles have to function together. In the case of supermart.ng for instance, there are merchandisers who go out to take inventory of the products, there is also a team of personal shoppers who professionally picks the products and package them. After the packaging, there is a team of well-trained drivers who ensures that products are delivered in good condition to the buyers. A team of customer care attendants also exist to ensure that customers are satisfied with the service. In this way, e-commerce is creating jobs across multiple industry including operations and logistics.
In essence, the use of e-commerce in the diversification of the economy will not only increase revenue but will reduce unemployment through creation of multiple jobs.
