CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
1.1 BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY
The Nigeria economy has undergone structural changes in the past three decades form a predominantly agricultural economy in the 1960s to an economy mainly reliant on oil form the mild 1970 the result was that the consumption to rationalize imports when the oil boom gave way to an oil glut led to the emergence of trade arrears. A growing debt burden also surface in the early 1990 as a result of jumbo loans acquired form the international capital market. Most less developed countries including Nigeria have turned to import substitution policy in order to become self-suiffcient and to help develop indigenous industries that will need raw materials in order to production these products most of these imputs are not locally available. Consequently the industries depends heavily on imported inputs of raw materials machinery capital equipment and general consumer goods it requires therefore a complementary development in the agricultural sector which provides the earning necessary to finance the minimum level of imports required to sustain the continued growth of the local industries. Unfortunately the policies adopted to reserve the market for the domestic product primary tariffs is some how based in its effects against production for export countries who rely on import substitution as a means of developing their economics the system of protection is adopted and consist primarily of the use of import restrictions which take various forms including outright ban or total prohibition of imports high import duties or tariffs in the form of complicated customs administration or the placing of specific commodities on license. These restrictions are used either to shut out competition entirely or its give domestic producers a significant cost advantage our foreign producers the scope of this paper covers the year between 1995 and 1999 the focus as on the impact of restrictions or measures introduced by the federal government during these years and whether these measure have actually achieved their primary objectives
