A Kano based economist, Mohammed Sagagi, has identified seven areas of economic concerns which the administration of President Muhammadu Buhari must address for Nigeria to move out of the current economic recession.
The identified areas of focus, according to Sagagi, are, the depressed public revenue, the state of the nation weak currency, high inflationary pressures, unemployment and under employment, declining capital importation, policy inconsistency/ incoherence, as well as, general uncertainty that characterized the economy.
On the way forward, he suggested that the government must go beyond focusing on the issue of the monetary policy alone, and put in place measures to scale up the nation competitiveness which is occasioned by unfriendly business environment.
Although the Economist acknowledged that the prevailing economic challenge in the country was precipitated dominantly by the global oil crises, he however believed that addressing the identified problems would go a long way in mitigating problems confronting it.
Sagagi, who made this disclosure to BusinessDay on the side-lines of the recent AGM of the Kano branch of the Manufacturers Association of Nigeria, noted that tackling the identified challenges will help improve the nation`s investment climate, as well as boost general business environment.
“The shrinking economy I am talking about is captured in the current state of our GDP which has been on a declining trend in the Q4 of 2014 it was 5.94%, Q1 2015: 3.96%, Q4 2015:2.11%, Q1 2016: -0.36%, and Q2 2016:2.06%.
“Non-oil GDP: declining trend also: Q2 2015:3.46%, Q1 2016: -0.18%, and Q2 2016: -0.38%. Similar trend has characterized the Oil GDP, and the contribution of the Manufacturing sector to the GDP, the only exception was the Agriculture sector” he explained.
Speaking specifically on the Manufacturing Sector Growth, he stated that the Sector has continued to experienced negative growth since 2015 except the 1% growth it recorded in the fourth quarter of the same year.
He noted that the total output for the Sector in 2016 declined by 7% in the first quarter, and 3.36% in the second quarters, while, the output in the third quarter declined by 4.38%.
Similarly, Sagagi observed that national currency has being experiencing systematic decline also, the value of the currency on BDC Exchange Rate index has gone down steadily from N150/US dollar in January 14, 2016 to over N450/US Dollar today.
The expert disclosed that the shrinking economic environment has created tremendous impact on the ability of players in the manufacturing sector to carry out their operations, in particular.
On the way forward, he suggested that the government must go beyond focusing on the issue of the monetary policy alone, and put in place measures scale up the nation competitiveness which is occasioned by unfriendly business environment.
“Deepen competitiveness –enhancing supply side reforms to attract additional investments and strengthen the productive sector, initiative protection of selective and time –bound tariffs, subsidies, and other incentives.
“In addition, Government also needs to support the emergence of new sectors of economic activity through competitiveness reforms that foster innovation” Sagagi added.
