International trade has been identified by many economists to be an engine for growth and development. Presently there is virtually no country around the world that does not trade with another country. There has been an increase in the number of bilateral trade agreement and multilateral trade agreement across the globe. The objective of this paper is to make a positive policy contribution that will help policymakers in Nigeria map out appropriate policies that can determine the source of productivity growth with respect to international trade in order to achieve economic development. In this study, secondary data was collected from CBN bulletins, National Bureau of Statistics and UNCTAD covering periods from 1975 to 2012. The OLS regression method of statistical analysis was employed to analyse the multiple econometric model. The result indicates that total trade, FDI flow, exchange rate and degree of openness are statistically significant to growth. Total trade, FDI flow and exchange rate are positively contributing to growth while degree of openness of the Nigeria economy is negatively contributing to growth. The dummy variable, political stability is not statistically significant to growth in Nigeria. The finding shows that trade contribute positively to economic growth but Nigeria’s trade policies, and implementation is still not growth friendly. As a result of the findings, some policy recommendations were made among which is trade policies in Nigeria need to be reviewed, reappraised and reinvigorated to encourage the gain of trade in order to foster growth, through diversification of the economy to areas such as agriculture, industrialisation, privatisation of the power sector, and building of oil refineries to reduce importation of petroleum produce, among others. The port and border system should be critically looked into in the areas of adequate personnel, the personnel should be trained and equipped in order to carry out their duty, such as curbing smuggling.

International trade has been identified by many economists to be an engine for growth and development. Presently there is virtually no country around the world that does not trade with another country. There has been an increase in the number of bilateral trade agreement and multilateral trade ag...