By Jeph Ajobaju, Chief Copy Editor
Jobless rate in Nigeria has more than tripled in the past five years, with official data showing about 21.7 million are unemployed out of a labour force of 80.2 million.
Nigeria’s overall population, the largest in Africa, is estimated at 200 million. The 21.7 million unemployed is more than the population of 35 of the 54 countries on the continent.
In the latest figures published by the Nigerian Bureau of Statistics (NBS), one in every two Nigerians in the labour force is either unemployed or underemployed.
The most recent data as of the second quarter of 2020 (Q2 2020) showed that unemployment rate jumped 27.1 per cent from 23.1 per cent in Q3 2018, when the report was last published.
Underemployment rate – which reflects those working less than 40 hours a week, or in jobs that underutilises skill, time, or education – shot 28.6 per cent.
Impact of high demand for education
Among those aged between 25 and 34, the largest bloc of the labour force, the unemployment rate is even higher at 30.7 per cent.
This 25-34 age bloc has the most Nigerians with higher education, in a country where thousands graduate from university every year without jobs.
Yet, demand for higher education is very high and local universities do not have space for all applicants year after year.
The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) announced last year that 1.9 million candidates registered for the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) to begin tertiary education at 100 level that year.
When those who qualified for direct entry to university at 200 level without having to write the UTME are added, the total number of applicants was more than two million.
Many parents send their children to universities abroad. And some of them graduate and return to join the labour market in Nigeria.
The administration of President Muhammadu Buhari has struggled to deliver economic policies to drive growth and create jobs, but unemployment rate has more than tripled since he took office in May 2015.
Situation likely to get worse
Quartz Africa reports that Nigeria’s job crisis does not exist in a vacuum.
It cites perennial under-funding of education that has resulted in a significant decline in both the quality of teachers and infrastructure in schools.
The problems are compounded by recurring strike actions by public university lecturers amid protests over low wages and benefits.
The deficit in Nigeria’s educational system is highlighted by the fact that only one in four Nigerians applying to university will get a spot.
As jobs and economic opportunities disappear, wealthy and middle class Nigerians are increasingly sending their children abroad for university education, to give them an edge in Nigeria’s job market or help them compete elsewhere.
In the United States alone, the economic impact of spending by Nigerian students reached $514 million in the 2018/2019 academic year, according to data from the Institute of International Education (IIE).
That exceeds the economic impact of students from countries including France, Germany, and the United Kingdom in the same period.
The lack of jobs in Africa’s largest economy and most populous country is unlikely to get better soon.
The World Bank predicts Nigeria’s flailing economy is set for its worst recession in four decades as the effects of the coronavirus pandemic continue to manifest.
Nigeria has been badly hit by the near total shutdown of the global oil economy, given its dependence on the commodity as its biggest revenue source.
Bleak economic growth and the rise in unemployed Nigerians will only compound the long-running problem with lifting citizens out of poverty.
Despite sustained high oil prices in the 2010s, Nigeria overtook India in 2018 as the country with the most people in extreme poverty.