Despite growing interest in integrated transport systems, Nigeria continues to struggle with the development of a fully connected multimodal logistics network. Weak coordination across road, rail, air, and maritime transport, combined with regulatory bottlenecks and infrastructure deficits, has significantly reduced system efficiency.
According to guardian.ng, experts warn that these challenges are inflating logistics costs and undermining the smooth movement of goods from production hubs to markets, limiting overall economic competitiveness.
Efficient multimodal systems reduce transportation time, lower operational costs, and improve trade competitiveness. Developed economies have successfully integrated ports, airports, rail lines and highways into coordinated logistics ecosystems that support industrial growth and reduce the cost of moving goods.
Data from the Nigeria Bureau of Statistics (NBS) indicated that the country’s freight and logistics market was valued at $10.95 billion in 2025, while the sector contributed about 3.5 per cent to the country’s gross domestic product (GDP) through transportation, warehousing, freight forwarding, storage, and courier services.
However, persistent inefficiency of multimodal transportation has continued to inflate the prices of commodities, increase business operational costs and weaken economic competitiveness.
Despite the country’s leading economic position in Africa and its status as the continent’s biggest consumer market, Nigeria still struggles with major logistics bottlenecks that have slowed trade, disrupted supply chains, and contributed significantly to inflation.
Industry experts said that unless urgent reforms are implemented across the road, rail, maritime, and aviation sectors, the country may continue to face rising living costs and declining productivity.
The Managing Director of Flights and Logistics Solution Limited, Amos Akpan, in an interview with The Guardian, said poor infrastructure, multiple taxation, corruption, and a lack of coordination among transport modes were among the major factors crippling the multimodal transportation and logistics sector.
He said the situation had driven up the cost of goods and services nationwide.
Akpan explained that although multimodal transportation involves the seamless movement of goods and persons through a combination of road, rail, air and waterways, Nigeria currently lacks an organised and integrated system to support such operations.
According to him, logistics operators in the country are compelled to improvise by combining available transport modes based on terrain and destination accessibility.
Akpan cited the example of transporting vaccines to riverine communities, noting that operators often have to move such cargo by air to the nearest airport, then by road to a riverside, and finally by boat to the final destination.
He stressed that the absence of integrated infrastructure had made logistics operations cumbersome and expensive, adding that rail lines linking farming communities to export processing terminals at airports would significantly improve cargo movement.
The logistics expert lamented that the operating environment in Nigeria was designed against the survival of logistics businesses, particularly due to excessive levies and extortion by security agencies.
According to him, transporting agricultural produce such as yams from Nasarawa to Lagos or plantains from Obudu to Port Harcourt attracts substantial unofficial payments at security checkpoints, sometimes exceeding the goods’ actual value.
He said: “For instance, if you have to move a time-definite vaccine to an island in the riverine part of Southern Nigeria from Abuja or Lagos, you will send it by flight to the nearest airport, use a motor by road from the airport to the river bank and finally use a boat to ferry it to the destination island.
“This implies that the logistics companies in Nigeria must adjust to the Nigerian situation by devising links with the operators of various transport modes in the territories. For example, it would have been better if there were rail lines that transport produce intended for export from farm communities to the cargo export processing terminal at the airports.
“There are other issues like the need to apply modern technology in the documentation and tracking of shipments with logistics companies. No domestic airline is linked to a tracking system with logistics operators.”
Akpan also decried the multiplicity of taxes and permits imposed on logistics operators within cities, revealing that a delivery van operating in major cities such as Lagos, Abuja and Port Harcourt requires as many as 48 different documents to ply the roads legally.
Besides, he emphasised that poor coordination among neighbouring states worsens the burden on operators.
He also criticised the use of inappropriate vehicles for transporting perishables and pharmaceutical products, noting that most temperature-sensitive goods are still transported in ordinary trucks meant for hardware and general cargo.
Akpan posited that inefficiencies, corruption, and high operating costs had combined to make Nigeria’s logistics sector uncompetitive relative to global standards.
Akpan called for massive investment in transportation infrastructure, harmonisation of regulations across states, reduction of multiple levies, and improved coordination across transport modes to improve intermodal logistics.
Also, rail transport consultant, Rowland Ataguba, mentioned poor handling practices, inadequate infrastructure, and weak regulatory systems as major factors responsible for the ongoing challenges confronting multimodal transportation and logistics operations in Nigeria.
Ataguba, who is also the Managing Director of Bethlehem Rail Infrastructure Ltd, London, United Kingdom, told The Guardian that transportation was a major enabler of economic development.
According to him, multimodal transportation seeks to combine the most suitable transport modes to efficiently move people and goods from origin to destination, but he regretted that operational inefficiencies at transfer points continued to create significant bottlenecks in the system.
He noted that transhipment points, where goods are transferred from one mode of transport to another, often become chokepoints that can disrupt entire supply chains.
He said: “Whereas each mode comes with its own unique challenges, a main challenge arises at the interfaces where transfers from one mode to another occur. These are generally known as transhipment points and can become bottlenecks or chokepoints, potentially triggering a domino effect on supply chains.
“Other inefficiencies can arise from poor handling or poor-quality infrastructure leading to damaged goods, which can cause artificial scarcities with the attendant inflationary impacts.”
These, Ataguba further said, frequently resulted in damaged goods, artificial scarcity and inflationary pressures within the economy.
He also blamed weak regulatory frameworks for worsening supply chain disruptions, warning that poor oversight could trigger wider economic consequences.
Speaking on the economic impact of logistics inefficiencies, Ataguba said that delays, losses and operational struggles significantly increase the cost of transporting goods and services.
He stated that the additional costs incurred by shippers are ultimately passed on to consumers through higher prices for goods and services.
He emphasised that at times, transporting a container from Guangdong in China to Apapa Port in Lagos, Nigeria, could be cheaper than moving the same container from Apapa to Kwali in Abuja.
He maintained that improving transportation and logistics infrastructure, alongside better coordination among transport modes, would deliver substantial economic benefits to the country.
The consultant posited that reducing delays and operational waste would lower costs, improve productivity and enhance supply chain predictability, thereby encouraging specialisation and strengthening comparative economic advantages.
Also, Associate Professor of Marketing at Keele University, United Kingdom, Emmanuel Mogaji, said one of the major bottlenecks affecting multimodal transportation and logistics operations in Nigeria is the limited understanding of transport as a connected service ecosystem rather than isolated modes of movement.
Mogaji explained that road transport operators, rail agencies, port authorities, logistics firms, and government regulators often work independently, with minimal coordination or integration of activities.
According to him, this fragmented approach reduces efficiency, increases delays, and limits seamless movement of goods and passengers across transport modes.
He added that the challenge is further compounded by the highly informal nature of Nigeria’s transport sector, where individual operators and organisations tend to develop their own systems and infrastructure without strong incentives for collaboration or shared planning.
He added: “Inefficiencies in transportation and logistics significantly increase the overall cost of goods and services in Nigeria because businesses and consumers are forced to absorb multiple layers of costs across fragmented transport systems.
“At different stages of the supply chain, there are numerous stakeholders, operators, checkpoints, intermediaries, and informal charges that contribute to delays, duplication of effort, and higher operating expenses.”
Mogaji further stated that bureaucratic bottlenecks, weak infrastructure integration, inconsistent regulations, and poor coordination between transport modes increased costs, which ultimately were passed on to consumers through higher prices for goods and services.
Besides, a professor of transport planning and policy at Lagos State University, Samuel Odewumi, said Nigeria’s multimodal transportation system was constrained by a combination of infrastructure, institutional, operational, and policy-related challenges.
Odewumi stated that one of the most critical bottlenecks was the overdependence on road transport for both passenger and freight movement.
He emphasised that 80 per cent of cargo movement in the country was still road-based, placing enormous pressure on highways that are already in poor condition.
“Another major challenge is the weak integration among transport modes. Ideally, ports, railways, inland waterways, airports, and road networks should operate as a connected logistics chain.
“However, in Nigeria, these systems largely function in isolation. Rail links to major seaports remain inadequate, inland dry ports are underutilised, and water transport infrastructure is still poorly developed,” he added.
Odewumi, who doubles as the acting Vice-Chancellor, University of Uyo, said improving transportation and logistics infrastructure would have transformative economic benefits for Nigeria.
