News
On August 26th and 27th 2025, the Tax Policy Division (TPD) of Nigeria's Federal Ministry of Finance, in collaboration with the TaxDev programme, hosted an interactive two-day training on excise duty policy in Abuja.
The workshop brought together 15 representatives from key agencies including from the TPD, the Federal Inland Revenue Service, the Nigerian Customs Service and the Presidential Fiscal Policy and Tax Reforms Committee. The objective of the exercise was to enhance understanding of excise duties as a policy area, with a view to guiding the development of excise duties for alcohol and cigarettes in the future.
Led by Steve Macey, Senior Technical Advisor for Nigeria at TaxDev, the sessions explored the rationale and policy goals of excise duties, balancing public health considerations for alcohol, tobacco and sugar-sweetened beverages with revenue mobilisation objectives.
Unlike traditional training formats, this workshop emphasised collaboration and applied learning. Through group exercises, participants debated trade-offs between specific and ad valorem duties, the case for focusing directly on harmful content such as Alcohol by Volume (ABV) or tobacco strength and assessed potential distributional impacts of excise duties.
The closing session featured an open policy dialogue where participants outlined priority areas for Nigeria’s future excise duty regime, highlighting the need for careful implementation and cross-government coordination.
The training represents a key step in building a technical understanding of excise duties amongst participants. Participation from multiple government agencies reflected a shared, cross-government commitment to collaboration on revenue collection.
Group photo on the final day of training (Photo: Steve Macey/ TaxDev)
Published on: 6th February 2026
Print
