The headache of medicines' supply in Nigeria: an exploratory study on the most critical challenges of pharmaceutical outbound value chains

The outbound segment of any product's value chain is very critical in its delivery to the final consumer/customer. In this study, the pharmaceutical supply chains management in Nigeria with emphasis on the challenges of the outbound value chains was investigated. A quantitative survey of all the seven categories of both the private and public sectors of the Nigerian pharmaceutical industry was conducted. Data analysis shows six most critical challenges facing the delivery of medicines in Nigeria. Exploratory factor analysis of the data extracted two main factors out of challenges named "people & competency issues" and "infrastructural & regulatory inadequacies". Valuable contributions from this study to knowledge, research methodology and policies have been made from the results of this study. The findings will be useful for policy and decision makers in both public and private sectors of the pharmaceutical industry in Nigeria and other resource-poor countries. (C) 2020 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V.