Weak revenue, poor investments to limit Nigeria’s economic recovery –World Bank

The World Bank said on Tuesday a weak fiscal base, poor investments and a host of other factors would speed up a subdued growth in the Nigerian economy this year.

The Washington-based multilateral lender predicted that Africa’s largest economy would scrape a 1.1 percent growth in 2021 and put the rate of global expansion at 4 percent.

“Activity is nevertheless anticipated to be dampened by low oil prices, OPEC quotas, falling public investment due to weak government revenues, constrained private investment due to firm failures, and subdued foreign investor confidence,” the World Bank said of Nigeria in a report, Global Economy to Expand by Four percent in 2021; Vaccine Deployment and Investment Key to Sustaining the Recovery.

The Bretton Woods organization said the economic output of sub-Saharan Africa tapered by 3.7 percent on the back of the COVID-19 pandemic and upset in commercial operations resulting from lockdown last year.

Income per capita declined by 6.1 percent, causing a regression in average standards of living to the levels they were 10 years before in 25 percent of the countries in the region.

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The World Bank affirmed that nations with huge domestic outbreaks, those whose economies hinged principally on tourism and travel, and commodity exporters especially oil-exporting nations, were most hammered by the crisis.

It added: “In Nigeria and South Africa, output fell sharply last year. Nigeria’s economy is estimated to have contracted 4.1 percent in 2020, as the effects of the pandemic impacted economic activity in all sectors.

“In South Africa, where economic activity was on weak footing before COVID-19, output is estimated to have fallen 7.8 percent last year.

“The country suffered the most severe outbreak of the pandemic in the region and underwent strict lockdowns that brought the economy to a standstill.”

Africa’s most industrialised economy, South Africa, is projected to recover by 3.3 percent this year.

There is a huge possibility that recovery in the global economy will be muted except policy makers make forceful efforts to curb the pandemic and execute strategies that will better investment.

The World Bank observed that even though the world economy returned to growth in 2020 after a shrink of 4.3 percent, COVID-19 had sparked up fatalities and illness of great magnitude throwing global citizens in their million to penury and could heap pressure on economic activity and incomes for long.

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