Poverty in Nigeria

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Nigeria had one of the world's highest economic growth rates, averaging 7.4% according to the Nigeria economic report that was released in July 2019 by the World Bank.^[1] Following the oil price collapse in 2014–2016, combined with negative production shocks, the gross domestic product (GDP) growth rate dropped to 2.7% in 2015. In 2016 during its first recession in 25 years, the economy contracted by 1.6%.^[2] Nationally, 43 percent of Nigerians (89 million people) live below the poverty line, while another 25 percent (53 million) are vulnerable.^[3] For a country with massive wealth and a huge population to support commerce, a well-developed economy, and plenty of natural resources such as oil,^[4] the level of poverty remains unacceptable.^[5] However, poverty may have been overestimated due to the lack of information on the extremely huge informal sector of the economy,^[6][7] estimated at around 60% more, of the current GDP figures.^[8] As of 2018, the population growth rate is higher than the economic growth rate, leading to a slow rise in poverty. According to a 2018 report by the World Bank, almost half the population is living below the international poverty line ($2 per day), and unemployment peaked at 23.1%.^[9]

Nigeria had one of the world's highest economic growth rates, averaging 7.4% according to the Nigeria economic report that was released in July 2019 by the World Bank.^[1] Following the oil price collapse in 2014–2016, combined with negative production shocks, the GDP growth rate dropped to 2.7% in 2015. In 2016 during its first recession in 25 years, the economy contracted by 1.6%.^[2] Many individuals are faced with limited financial opportunities, extreme information poverty and unemployment, a lack of access to information technology resources, and other uniquely debilitating environmental circumstances as poverty.^[10]

However, these programs have largely failed to overcome the three reasons^[11] for this persistent poverty: income inequality, ethnic conflict, and political instability with corruption. The impact of COVID-19 has been disastrous to the economy with inflation on food items on the rise, markets were disrupted by the increase in prices of things and purchasing power.