Authored by Maryam Umar Ayomide
Abstract
This research examines the consequences of protectionist trade interventions in Nigeria by analysing two critical case studies: rice import restrictions and the 2025 raw shea nut export ban. Utilising a classical liberal framework, the study observes that despite four decades of diverse protectionist measures, including outright bans and high tariffs, rice self-sufficiency remains elusive. These interventions have instead catalysed surging consumer prices that disproportionately burden urban poor households. Similarly, the August 2025 shea nut export ban collapsed farm-gate prices and undermined rural livelihoods without successfully building
domestic processing capacity, demonstrating the predictable failure of imposing restrictions before enabling the necessary investment climate. Drawing on Hayek’s theory of spontaneous order (1944) and Amartya Sen’s concept of substantive freedom (1999), this paper argues that trade restrictions constitute developmental regression when they limit occupational choice, constrain consumption possibilities, or foreclose entrepreneurial opportunities, regardless of any marginal gains in numerical output. Furthermore, the analysis contends that centralised state direction, characterised by overlapping agency mandates and crisis-driven politics, systematically produces inferior outcomes compared to market coordination. To substantiate this, the study employs a comparative analysis of New Zealand’s 1984–1990 agricultural deregulation, which reduced subsidies from 33% to 2.3% of
sectoral GDP while simultaneously increasing export volumes by 39%. This precedent demonstrates that liberty-oriented reforms achieve the value addition that protectionism fails to deliver.