Nnewi

Nnewi is a city with an estimated population of 1.1 million people (2021) in Anambra State in Southeast Nigeria.

Understand
As a fast developing city and a major industrial and commercial hub in Africa, Nnewi hosts major banks, and other financial institutions. Industries are located around the city and adjoining towns. Palm oil, cosmetics, motor, and motorcycle spare parts, books, and stationery, textiles, electric cables, and so on are produced in commercial quantity in the area.

In the typical Nnewi home, kola nuts, garden egg and peanut butter are kept in the refrigerator in case any stranger should visit their home. Every visitation to their home begins with the offering of the kola nuts to the visitor. The kola nut iindicates that the visitor is very much welcomed.

Get in
The city is east of the Niger River, and about 22 km southeast of Onitsha in Anambra State.

Get around
The primary means of transportation in Nnewi is motorcycles. Almost every household own at least one motorcycle and the commercial motorcycles exist too. There are also shuttles and Tricycles complementing the motorcycles as the means of transportation available across the city.

Do

 * New Yam Festival: In Nnewi, the occasion of Iri-ji ọhụrụ (new-yam eating) is a cultural festival because of its significance. Nnewi people celebrate their new yam festival usually at the end of August during which assortment of festivities mark the eating of new yam. These festivities normally include a lot of variety entertainment including performance of ceremonial rites by the Igwe (King), cultural dances by Igbo men, women and their children, and a display of Igbo cultural activities in the form of contemporary shows, masquerade dance, and feasting at a grand scale on a wide variety of food making up the menu of the Igbos.

Buy

 * Its main trading centres include Nkwo Nnewi market (the largest spare parts market in West Africa) and Nwafor market, Eke Amaobi market, Eke Ochie, Eke Ichi Market, and Orie otube Market.
 * Arts and crafts: Works of art produced in the area include carved doors, walking sticks of different designs, sculptures, flutes, wooden mortars and pestles, gongs, and the famous talking drums. Metal works and various types of productions are locally fashioned.

Eat
Several fast food chains such as Mr Bigg's, Ever Fresh, Kitchen De Royale (KDR), Gracia salad, N.K. Salad, Chicken Legacy, and Milky Chunky are found in Nnewi. There is also a variety of local restaurants offering a variety of continental & Igbo dishes, indoor and outdoor catering services.



Connect
For most locations in Nnewi, there is coverage of the 2G/3G/4G mobile networks, but signal strength usually diminishes further away from the city center, and you might occasionally experience network outage for all or some of the mobile phone service providers in the remote areas of the city. Different networks tend to be more stable and reliable in different locations of the city at different times.

If you are planning a visit to Nnewi, like many other places in Nigeria, you should probably consider having multiple SIM cards, preferably for all the mobile service providers, since you can't tell which will be more stable and reliable at a time in your location during your visit. And if you will risk not having any of them, you might be better off not risking the MTN network, because, from indications, it seem to perform well than the others, though its rates may be high and its offers and services might be stringent, but you are less likely to be concerned of erratic voice and data connection compared to others.

Go next

 * Benin City
 * Enugu
 * Port Harcourt
 * Warri