Export, Foreign Investments Key Factors in Shaping The Economy – Andrew Nevin

Exportation and collaboration with foreign investors have been listed as factors that can shape Nigeria’s economy. With the country investing only about 18-19% of its Gross Domestic Product (GDP), it is important to start looking into some of these untapped assets.

Speaking during the Nairametrics Economic Outlook webinar themed: “Your Money, The Economy and Government Policies”, Financial Services Leader and Chief economist at PWC Nigeria, Andrew Nevin noted that the movement of informal sectors to formal sectors is crucial in further expanding the country’s GDP.

According to him, Nigeria is a very wealthy country with enormous amounts of assets that are not producing returns.

He added that many of those assets are in real estate, which could be beneficial for the government.

“For example, Kaduna state is implementing property tax. That will enable the state to solve its IGR problem. Assets like the national theatre and the three refineries are not only dead but producing zero returns”, he noted.

Nevin also opined that Nigeria’s economy can be shaped through outsourcing, encouragement of fintechs, as well as exportation. This, according to him, would attract stakeholders and foreign investors into the country.

Investors King recalls that Nigeria’s economy entered a recession in 2020 due to a fall in crude oil prices on account of falling global demand, as well as the spread of COVID–19.

However, the African Development Bank(Afdb) projected that the country’s economy is expected to grow by 2.9% in 2022, based on an expected recovery in crude oil prices and production.

The World bank, on the other hand, projected that the Nigerian economy is expected to grow by 2.5 percent in 2022.

The World Bank, in its January 2022 Global Economic Prospects report, noted that the oil sector is expected to benefit from higher oil prices, a gradual easing of the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) production cuts and domestic regulatory reforms.