Nigeria, a nation of over 220 million people, the largest economy in Africa, and a country endowed with vast forests and abundant agricultural resources, spends over N1.1 trillion annually importing paper. This is not a typographical error. In 2025 alone, Nigeria’s paper import bill reached N1.107 trillion, up from N328.9 billion in 2021, representing a staggering increase of over 236 per cent in just four years. The cumulative import bill for paper and paper products between 2021 and 2025 exceeded N3.37 trillion. Industry experts estimate the annual drain on foreign reserves at over $5 billion. Yet, incredibly, Nigeria was once a paper-producing nation. Between the late 1960s and 1980s, the country established three major pulp and paper mills: the Nigerian Paper Mill (NPM) in Jebba, Kwara State, producing industrial grades of paper; the Iwopin Pulp and Paper Company in Ogun State, producing fine writing and printing paper; and the Nigerian Newsprint Manufacturing Company (NNMC) in Oku-Iboku, Akwa Ibom State, producing newsprint. At their peak in the 1980s, these three mills produced tens of thousands of tons of paper annually, significantly reducing dependence on imports and even supporting exports to international markets. Today, all three are dead.
The story of how Nigeria killed its paper industry is a story of neglect, mismanagement, policy inconsistency, and the systematic stripping of national assets. The Nigerian Paper Mill in Jebba, once the pride of Kwara State, now stands as a ghost, its machinery rusting and its premises overgrown, a silent monument to a failed dream. The Iwopin mill, commissioned in 1975, has been completely emptied-all its machinery and buildings sold as scrap, leaving nothing but weeds. Oku-Iboku, commissioned in 1986, has suffered a similar fate. These were not small enterprises. They were strategic national assets, representing billions of naira in public investment and the hopes of thousands of Nigerian workers. Their collapse is a betrayal of the Nigerian people.
What makes this tragedy even more egregious is that the collapse was not inevitable. In the mid-2000s, the mills were privatised under the Olusegun Obasanjo administration. The promise was that private sector efficiency would revive them. Instead, privatisation became their death knell. Experts now agree that the privatisation process was deeply flawed, with experts conspicuously missing from the acquisition process. Due diligence was not done before selling the mills’ assets. The buyers, in many cases, lacked the financial capacity and technical expertise to revive the mills. What followed was asset stripping-the systematic sale of valuable equipment and machinery for scrap, leaving the mills hollowed out and useless. The consequences were severe: huge job losses, a bad name for privatisation, and the complete collapse of domestic paper production. As one observer put it, ‘privatisation without strategic depth merely transferred dead assets to private hands unable to revive them’.
The economic cost of this collapse is staggering. Nigeria now loses an estimated N674 billion annually to foreign paper producers. The paper sector’s contribution to Gross Domestic Product has stagnated at a marginal 0.14 per cent. Local manufacturers now meet less than 10 per cent of national demand, which is estimated at over three million metric tonnes annually. By contrast, exports remain negligible-N19.6 billion in 2025 compared to imports of N1.107 trillion. The cost of importing a ton of paper has risen from N600,000 to N2 million in recent years, directly inflating the cost of books and educational materials. This has contributed to a dearth of reading materials and a poor reading culture, with far-reaching implications for educational quality. The printing and publishing industry, valued at over N300 billion annually and employing hundreds of thousands, has been severely constrained by the collapse of domestic paper production. Over 80 per cent of printing inputs-including paper, ink, and plates-are imported, exposing operators to foreign exchange volatility and high production costs.
The human cost is equally devastating. Experts estimate that Nigeria may have lost over 300,000 potential jobs across the paper value chain, spanning pulp production, manufacturing, printing, and logistics. When the mills shut down, these workers were not just unemployed; they were stripped of their dignity and their futures. With no jobs and no hope, many turned to crime. The connection between closed factories and rising insecurity is direct and undeniable. The armed robbers, kidnappers, bandits, and cybercriminals terrorising communities across Nigeria are, in many cases, products of industrial collapse. They did not choose crime because they were evil; they chose it because they were hungry, desperate, and had no other options. The collapse of the paper industry is not just an economic failure; it is a national security crisis in the making. The Nigeria First Policy, President Bola Tinubu’s initiative to prioritise locally made goods in public procurement, has been hailed as a bold step towards reducing import dependence. Yet months after its unveiling, industry stakeholders warn that implementation remains non-existent in the paper and printing sectors, where foreign dominance continues unchecked. Local producers are unable to compete fairly against an unchecked influx of underpriced and substandard imported paper. As one industry leader put it, ‘We are effectively exporting jobs and importing poverty’.
If Nigeria’s paper mills were functioning Today, they would directly employ tens of thousands and indirectly employ hundreds of thousands more. Those jobs would keep families fed, children in school, and young people away from crime. The raw materials are available-bamboo, kenaf, rice straw, sugarcane bagasse and other agricultural residues. Research has shown that tree species needed for manufacturing woodfree bond paper can be grown in Nigeria with a gestation period of six months, not twelve years or more as formerly believed. The technology exists. The market is vast and growing. What is lacking is political will-the will to reverse the flawed privatisations, to prosecute those who stripped the assets, to enforce the Nigeria First Policy, and to build a new industrial policy that prioritises local production over import dependency. The cost of inaction is staggering: N674 billion lost annually to foreign producers, $5 billion drained from the economy each year, 300,000 jobs gone, and a nation dependent on foreign suppliers for the very materials of education, governance, and commerce. The cost of action, by contrast, is modest compared to the benefits. Reviving Nigeria’s paper industry would save billions in foreign exchange, create hundreds of thousands of jobs, reduce insecurity, and build the industrial capacity that every developed nation has built. The choice is clear. The time to act is now.