World Bank says 82.4m Nigerians now deeper in poverty
World Bank says 82.4m need urgent, practical poverty reduction measures
By Jeph Ajobaju, Chief Copy Editor
Poverty has enlarged itself and swallowed 82.4 million people into its suffocating bowels in Nigeria where only 17 per cent of workers earn enough to get yanked off the jaws of impoverishment, the World Bank says in its latest report.
Deep, practical, and visible structural reforms have to be implemented urgently to reverse the situation in which 4 out 10 Nigerians live below the poverty line, the World Bank counselled.
World Bank Country Director for Nigeria Shubham Chaudhuri insisted in the report, titled “A Better Future for All Nigerians: Nigeria Poverty Assessment 2022”, that pro-poor policies should be implemented.
The policies, he stressed, should unlock fiscal space, reform expensive subsidies, and incorporate countervailing measures to protect the poor.
The bank warned that Nigeria is facing sluggish growth, low human capital, labour market weaknesses, and exposure to shocks, all of which hold back poverty reduction initiatives.
The report is the culmination of the engagement of the World Bank in Nigeria in the past two years on poverty and inequality data and analytics.
It leans heavily on the 2018/19 Nigerian Living Standards Survey (NLSS) which provided the first official poverty numbers in almost a decade, and also gleaned figures from the Nigeria COVID-19 National Longitudinal Phone Survey (NLPS).
The surveys were done by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) in collaboration with the World Bank.
__________________________________________________________________
Related articles:
Buhari as mini antiChrist wasting Nigeria
End CBN loans, lift the poor, World Bank tells Abuja
World Bank votes $800m for poor Nigerian households
N5, 000 Conditional Cash Transfer not enough to pull Nigerians out of poverty – Obi
__________________________________________________________________
Profile and drivers of poverty
The World Bank said its report collates the latest evidence on the profile and drivers of poverty to show that 4 in 10 Nigerians live below the national poverty line.
“Many Nigerians – especially in the country’s north – also lack education and access to basic infrastructure, such as electricity, safe drinking water, and improved sanitation.
“The report further notes that jobs do not translate Nigerians’ hard work into an exit from poverty, as most workers are engaged in small-scale household farm and non-farm enterprises; just 17 per cent of Nigerian workers hold the wage jobs best able to lift people out of poverty,” the report stressed, per Nairametrics reporting.
“It is clear that much needs to be done to help lift millions of Nigerians out of poverty, including boosting health and education, bolstering productive jobs, and expanding social protection.
“Yet implementing pro-poor initiatives requires unlocking fiscal space; reforming expensive subsidies – including fuel subsidies – will be essential, alongside countervailing measures to protect the poor as reforms are effected.”
The World Bank advocated deep, long-term reforms to foster and sustain pro-poor growth and raise Nigerians out of poverty. These include:
- Macroeconomic reforms – including fiscal, trade, and exchange rate policy
- Policies to boost the productivity of farm and non-farm household enterprises
- Improving access to electricity, water, and sanitation
- Bolstering information and communication technology
“These reforms together could help diversify the economy, invigorate structural transformation, create good, productive jobs, and support social protection programs as well as other redistributive government policies.
“These reforms are urgent as Nigeria’s population continues to grow; now is the time to ensure that the country seizes the promise of its young people for economic prosperity.
“Shaping the specifics of Nigeria’s poverty-reducing policies will depend strongly on redoubling efforts to gather and analyse data regularly.”
The last NLSS report released by the NBS that covered 2019 classified 40.1 per cent of Nigerians as poor by national standards. It is now estimated at 82.4 million.
NBS data shows that 4 out of 10 Nigerians have real per capita expenditures below N137,430 per year, which translates to N376.5 per day.
