Governance for Health Security: Lessons from Nigeria’s PVAC in Manufacturing Local Malaria Commodities

Background: The Presidential Initiative for Unlocking the Healthcare Value Chain (PVAC) was established to address systemic barriers to domestic manufacturing by providing a high-level governance mechanism that aligns national health-security priorities with industrial policy objectives. This paper analyses PVAC as an emerging governance model for accelerating local production of malaria commodities, including ACTs, APIs, LLINs, and RDTs. Methods: The study undertook a structured review of seven national technical briefs produced under the Enhancing Local Manufacturing and Supply Chain Management Project, an initiative of PVAC and the National Malaria Elimination Programme (NMEP), supported by the World Bank IMPACT Project. These were complemented by a national manufacturing readiness assessment and relevant regulatory and industrial policy documents. Document synthesis was appropriate given PVAC’s system-level mandate and enabled analysis of governance coordination, market-shaping interventions, and regulatory and capacity-strengthening reforms across institutions. Results: Evidence from the technical briefs and readiness assessment indicates that PVAC has generated tangible governance, regulatory, and market-shaping outcomes with implications for market predictability and manufacturing readiness. PVAC established multi-agency coordination mechanisms and facilitated the development of national roadmaps for LLINs, RDTs, ACTs, and API localisation. It introduced Nigeria’s first tiered procurement eligibility pathway, harmonised LLIN and RDT specifications, and supported national demand-consolidation modelling, improving clarity for manufacturers. Regulatory coordination strengthened GMP alignment, quality-control systems, and PQ-readiness pathways, while financing coordination linked manufacturers to public and development finance institutions using roadmap-aligned demand forecasts. Conclusion: PVAC’s governance model reflects international experiences in India, Ethiopia, and Bangladesh, where centralised coordination accelerated pharmaceutical industrialisation and strengthened health security. Beyond Nigeria, PVAC offers transferable lessons for other low- and middle-income countries seeking to leverage governance coordination, procurement reform, and regulatory alignment to advance pharmaceutical self-sufficiency and resilience against global supply shocks.