The National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control has set out measures to cut the cost and complexity of product registration for small businesses, including a 50 per cent reduction in registration charges for companies with five or fewer employees. NAFDAC Director-General Prof. Mojisola Adeyeye outlined the measures at the SMEDAN-NAFDAC Summit on Monday, 9 November, at the Ecobank Pan-African Centre in Victoria Island, Lagos.
What NAFDAC is offering
Adeyeye described four interventions for micro, small and medium-sized enterprises. The first is the fee reduction for firms with five or fewer employees. The second is electronic and assisted registration through the NAFDAC Automated Product Administration and Monitoring System, known as NAPAMS, which lets owners submit and track applications online from their workplace or even from home. The third is a Small Business Support Desk that guides small enterprises through the registration process. The fourth is the decentralisation of registration for MSME products to the agency’s zones.
She said the agency understands that cost, time and complexity can stop small enterprises from formalising, and that the measures are meant to remove those barriers.
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How the process works
The basic route begins with the owner obtaining the guidelines for the relevant product category from the NAFDAC website. The owner then submits the application and supporting documents through NAPAMS after paying the appropriate fees. Adeyeye also urged MSMEs to engage the agency early in product development and registration. Early contact lets an owner learn the requirements before committing money to packaging, labels and a production run.
Why it matters for small producers
For a small food, cosmetics or household products business, registration decides whether a product can legally reach the shelf. The agency says lower barriers should encourage more small manufacturers to formalise and bring their products into the regulated market. That matters beyond compliance. A registered product is easier to sell to supermarkets, distributors and export buyers, and a registered business builds the record that lenders ask for.
For a producer with three employees, a 50 per cent cut in registration charges is not a rounding adjustment. It can decide whether the registration fee is paid this quarter or postponed again.
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What is new and what is not
Several of these tools are not new. NAFDAC introduced NAPAMS in 2020 as an online system to help small businesses register products at lower cost. Registration delays have remained a long-running complaint among small producers, and the agency said in 2021 that food product registration should take no more than 90 days. The summit restated the measures, put them in front of business owners in a town-hall format and included a live demonstration of NAPAMS, while SMEDAN ran a business clinic through the conference to give owners direct access to regulators.
What to watch
The real test for small producers is speed and consistency. They will look at how quickly applications move through NAPAMS and whether zonal registration shortens the path for businesses outside Lagos and Abuja.
Cheaper fees only help if approvals arrive on time. A small producer who waits months for a certificate carries stock, rent and wages in the meantime, and that delay costs more than the fee.
