REFLECTIONS ON SINO-NIGERIAN ECONOMIC RELATIONS AND THE REGIME OF CURRENCY SWAP

Abstract

Made official in 1971, Sino-Nigeria bilateral ties have been sustained throughmutual exchanges and cooperation especially in the area of trade. To Nigeria, this partnership is of strategic importance in the light of the derivable benefits from Chinese advancement in technological know-how. For China on the other hand, Nigeria‟s large market and huge deposits of natural resources have been tantalizing for its industrial/manufacturing sector. In spite of these, there has been a growing ambivalence on the part of analysts over the growing inequality and imbalance that has characterizing this economic relationship since its inception owing to the fact that Nigeria has been negotiating from a position of disadvantage. This paper attempts to examine the complexities of this relationship by interrogating and highlighting some of the domestic variables working against Nigeria, and also to examine the implications of theCurrency Swap regime between Nigeria and China needed to bring about a favorable balance of trade for Nigeria in her trade relations with China. This research adopts a medley of two theories for analysis of this complex phenomenon namely, the Dependency theories and the Modernization theories.. Materials for the study are from secondary sources while analysis isdescriptive and historical. It was discovered that poverty in Nigeria among other factors, is reinforcing Chinese dominance of the bilateral ties while the paper recommend, amongst others, boosting of local production of imported Chinese products and to institute an aggressive and proper consumption reorientation along the line of “buy Nigeria” rather than Chinese goods.