Indian High Commissioner Abishek Singh says stronger investment has made Indian companies the second-largest private employer of Nigerians

Bilateral trade between Nigeria and India rose by about 26 per cent to $9 billion in the 2025-26 financial year, Indian High Commissioner to Nigeria Abishek Singh said in Abuja on Wednesday, August 12, 2026, as he highlighted expanding investment, employment and healthcare cooperation between the two countries.

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Singh said trade increased from $7.13 billion recorded in the 2024-25 financial year, describing the growth as evidence of a relationship that is steadily broadening beyond its traditional focus on crude oil and historical ties.

“Very happy to report that the trade for the financial year 2025-26 stands at around US dollar 9 billion, which is up from US dollar 7.13 billion in the financial year 2024-25,” Singh told journalists at a media briefing.

The High Commissioner said more than 200 Indian companies currently operating in Nigeria had created close to 100,000 jobs for Nigerians, making them, collectively, the second-largest employer of Nigerian workers after the Federal Government.

Indian businesses have established operations across pharmaceuticals, manufacturing, power, construction, consumer goods, healthcare and services, with several companies also setting up production facilities locally.

Singh said the expanding commercial relationship reflected what he described as a “multidimensional partnership”, with both countries increasingly collaborating in investment, security, technology, agriculture, healthcare and energy.

The relationship between Nigeria and India predates Nigerian independence. India opened a Liaison Office in Lagos in 1958, two years before Nigeria became independent in 1960.

Their ties were subsequently elevated to a Strategic Partnership during the visit of India’s then Prime Minister to Nigeria in October 2007.

Singh said the designation was significant because bilateral relations could no longer be defined solely by historical goodwill or oil.

“When I say Strategic Partnership, what does it mean? It means that India-Nigeria relations are no longer defined only by historical goodwill or oil trade,” he said.

The two countries have maintained high-level political engagement in recent years.

President Bola Tinubu visited India in September 2023 during India’s G20 presidency, while Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi made a state visit to Nigeria in November 2024.

Singh described Modi’s visit as historic because it came after an interval of about 17 years and resulted in extensive discussions with Tinubu on trade and investment, defence, energy, agriculture, health, education, technology and security.

Beyond trade, India has also provided development support to Nigeria.

Singh said India had extended concessional lines of credit worth $395 million to Nigeria, alongside capacity-building opportunities through the Indian Technical and Economic Cooperation programme.

The ITEC programme has provided training for Nigerians in areas including auditing, teaching, rural development, electrification and defence.

Healthcare emerged as another major area of cooperation during the briefing, with Indian officials highlighting both pharmaceutical trade and growing local manufacturing.

India’s Deputy High Commissioner to Nigeria, Vertika Rawat, said India currently supplies about 40 per cent of Nigeria’s pharmaceutical imports, while pharmaceutical exports to Nigeria reached $315 million in the 2024-25 financial year.

“India today supplies roughly 40% of Nigeria’s pharmaceutical imports, and for certain categories of medicine over 90%,” Rawat said.

She added that Indian companies had invested about $4 billion in pharmaceutical manufacturing in Nigeria, signalling a shift from simply exporting medicines towards producing more drugs within the country.

“This is what it means in practice for India to be the pharmacy of the world. It means not only affordable medicines reaching Nigerian homes, but also manufacturing medicines in Nigeria for Nigerian homes,” Rawat said.

The emphasis on local production comes as Nigeria continues to seek greater domestic pharmaceutical capacity and more resilient healthcare supply chains.

Rawat also pointed to India’s experience with health insurance as an area from which Nigeria could draw lessons as it works towards universal health coverage.

She said India had recorded improvements in maternal and child healthcare, financial inclusion and women’s empowerment, supported by large-scale national data collection and expanded access to health services.

According to Rawat, India’s sixth National Family Health Survey covered 639,000 families across 707 districts, which she described as “the largest single-round household health survey ever undertaken anywhere in the world.”

She said antenatal care now reached 96 per cent of pregnant women in India, while institutional deliveries had risen to 90.6 per cent.

Full immunisation among children aged 12 to 23 months also increased from 83.8 per cent to 87.1 per cent, while household coverage under health insurance or financing schemes rose from 41 per cent to 60.2 per cent.

For Nigeria, the expanding relationship with India comes at a time when the government is seeking to attract more foreign investment, strengthen domestic manufacturing and diversify trade beyond hydrocarbons.

The employment figures cited by Singh also point to the growing footprint of Indian businesses within the Nigerian economy, particularly in industries where local production can support skills development and supply chains.

The latest trade figures suggest that the commercial relationship is gaining momentum, but the wider partnership increasingly rests on more than the movement of goods between the two countries.

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From pharmaceuticals and healthcare to technology, agriculture, energy and capacity building, Nigeria and India are positioning their longstanding relationship around a broader economic and strategic agenda.