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Ware-Houses of Regret | Inside Nigeria’s silent factory crisis — how ₦2.14 trillion of unsold goods piled up while families choose between bus fare and breakfast.

The forklift’s reverse alarm echoes down Row 47 like a broken alarm clock. Another pallet of “Family-Sized Tomato Paste” lands on a floor already sagging from the weight of optimism. The warehouse manager, Mr. Sunday, doesn’t look up. He simply chalks one more tally on the rusted metal door: 38 000 cartons, expiry March 2025. “We are not storing products,” he mutters. “We are hoarding disappointment.”

Sunday works for one of the big-name food makers along the Oshodi-Apapa corridor. His depot is now a museum of unread price tags—cooking oil, noodles, detergent, tiles, plastic chairs—items Nigerians suddenly treat like luxury goods. The numbers back his gloom: according to the Manufacturers’ Association of Nigeria (MAN) quarterly survey released yesterday, unsold finished goods jumped 87 % in the third quarter to ₦2.14 trillion. That figure is larger than the 2024 budgets of Edo, Oyo and Rivers states combined, yet it represents goods gathering dust under iron roofs.

The 70 % Transport Tax Nobody Campaigned For. Walk into any Lagos commuter park at 6 a.m. and you will hear the same arithmetic. Fare from Mile 2 to CMS in June: ₦400. Today: ₦700.

Average receptionist salary: still ₦55 000 a month.

Titi Adewale, 29, sums it up while clutching a nylon of roasted corn she now calls breakfast: “After transport and fuel for the generator, my salary has already finished. Toothpaste has become a weekly decision.”

MAN’s survey shows Titi is not alone. Households now spend more than 70 % of income on transport and energy—diesel, petrol, generator repairs, t-fare, okada, keke. What remains is too thin to clear the glut piling up in factories from Agbara to Kano. At Honeywell’s depot in Sagamu, 38 000 bags of semolina will expire between now and February. A distributor who asked not to be named says he begged for 90-day credit: “They laughed. I laughed too. We both know I can’t sell it.”

PMI in Wonderland—Growth Without Buyers

The Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) still reads 56.9—above the 50-point boom line—yet the new-orders component slowed for the second straight month. Translation: machines are humming, shifts are running, but the buyers are missing. Dr. Afeez Balogun, economist at UNILAG, calls it “activity without appetite. Factories are producing for the warehouse, not the consumer. That is how you get negative real growth dressed up as expansion.”

Inside a noodle plant in Ogun State, three shifts remain on the roster. The production manager whispers: “If we drop to two shifts, government will quote us as job losses. If we keep three, we drown in inventory. We chose drowning; at least it is quieter.”

Extend and Pretend—Bankers’ Compulsory Dance

Commercial banks increased manufacturing exposure by 34 % in the third quarter, yet official NPL ratios remain “below 5 %.” A risk manager at a mid-tier bank spills the secret over lukewarm malt: “We roll over interest, capitalise unpaid invoices, restructure for 180 days. Everyone knows the loans are stressed; no one wants to book the loss.” So credit lines stay open, pallets keep rolling, and the can is kicked down a road already littered with expired goods.

Small Factories, Faster Bleeds

The pain is sharpest among SMEs. Sir-Chuks Electronics, a 45-worker assembly plant in Nnewi, typically converts inventory every 30 days. Today, flat-screen TVs sit for 90. “I owe suppliers $108 000,” the owner says. “If I sell at current market price I make a loss. If I don’t sell, I still owe. My wife asks why I still go to work. I tell her: hope is cheaper than divorce.”

The Policy Gap—Between Speech and Storehouse

The federal government’s response so far is a familiar playlist: “We will ramp up palliatives, improve logistics, fix the ports.” But inside the warehouses, words don’t pay forklift drivers. Customs still holds containers for weeks, diesel still sells for ₦1 250 a litre, and Apapa gridlock remains a 24-hour money-eating monster. Manufacturers say they spend ₦162 to move one bag of cement from Ogun to Abuja—more than the cost of making it.

Sunset at the Depot

Back in Row 47, Mr. Sunday padlocks the gate at 6 p.m. He will return tomorrow to add fresh tally marks. Somewhere in town, Titi Adewale boards an overloaded danfo, clutching her remaining ₦450. She needs ₦350 for the ride home, ₦100 for kerosene. Toothpaste can wait.

The forklift alarm fades, but the warehouse keeps filling—an economy producing what its people can no longer afford to buy.

This has been The Red Hot Report from Pepper-Room. The news that bears it all.