By Ferdinand Olise
The Director General of the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC), Prof. Mojisola Adeyeye, has solicited the support of international partners for the establishment of vaccine manufacturing facilities in Nigeria.
Prof. Adeyeye made the call in Lagos at the 8th Nigeria Pharma Manufacturers’ Expo, jointly organised by the Pharmaceutical Manufacturing Group of the Manufacturers Association of Nigeria (PMG-MAN) and PGE Expo Pvt Limited.
She said the agency has met eight of the nine requirements needed to attain full benchmarking for medicines and vaccines, but is being held back by the absence of local vaccine manufacturing.
According to her, NAFDAC is yet to achieve Lot Release for vaccines, the final requirement for attaining World Health Organization (WHO) Maturity Level 4.
“We want to call on our international partners that have been of tremendous help. Without them we wouldn’t have been here. I want to challenge them to contribute to fill and finish modular vaccine manufacturing so that we can get our Vaccine Lot Release,” she said.
The NAFDAC boss noted that Nigeria has the capacity to attain the certification, adding that the cost of achieving modular vaccine production is not prohibitive.
“To get Lot Release – Maturity Level 4, we have figured it out. It’s not going to cost too much. We will share that with you. Because we cannot afford to go back to where we used to be,” she said.
Recalling that NAFDAC previously manufactured vaccines, Prof. Adeyeye said it was time for the country to return to local vaccine production.
She commended President Bola Ahmed Tinubu for the Executive Order 2024, which she described as a game-changer for local pharmaceutical manufacturers operating under harsh economic conditions.
“I understand the stress our manufacturers are going through. Our manufacturers are patriots because they could have given up,” she said, noting that the Order had brought long-sought incentives to the industry.
She said the Coordinating Minister of Health and Social Welfare and the Minister of State for Health had also supported incentives for local manufacturers, leading to the initiative to unlock the pharmaceutical value chain.
Prof. Adeyeye disclosed that the agency’s Good Manufacturing Practice (GMP) Roadmap, which involved an eight-month audit of over 165 companies funded by USAID and executed by the United States Pharmacopeia (USP), has improved quality compliance across the industry.
The initiative, she said, resulted in a 70 percent reduction in importation under the ‘5 plus 5’ and Ceiling initiatives between 2021 and 2025, as local manufacturers scaled up production.
She attributed NAFDAC’s international recognition to continuous staff capacity building and quality improvements. The agency’s laboratory in Yaba was WHO pre-qualified in September 2023, and NAFDAC became a member of the International Medical Device Forum in 2023.
She added that NAFDAC became the first agency in Sub-Saharan Africa to be successfully re-benchmarked for WHO Maturity Level 3 at first attempt.
Earlier, the Chairman of PMG-MAN and Managing Director/CEO of Daily Need Limited, Mr. Oluwatosin Jolayemi, described the Expo as the only complete pharma manufacturing platform in Central and West Africa, bringing together manufacturers, regulators, investors and development partners.
While commending Prof. Adeyeye for driving GMP compliance and international best practices, he called for an extension of the presidential executive order beyond its March 2027 expiration by another two years.
“The journey towards medicine security and pharma sovereignty is not a short-term intervention. It requires policy consistency, investment, capability development and a predictable operating environment,” he said.
The two-day expo attracted 132 companies from the United States, China, Argentina, Egypt, India, Rwanda, Austria, UAE, France, Germany, Indonesia and Nigeria.
