Nigeria’s development plan fails again plunging millions into deeper poverty.
The 2021–2025 National Development Plan (NDP), which aimed to lift 35 million people out of poverty and create 21 million full-time jobs by 2025, has joined the long list of the country’s failed economic blueprints.
Instead of reducing poverty, the plan has seen an additional 44 million Nigerians plunged into extreme poverty. In 2021, the World Bank said 85 million Nigerians lived below the international poverty line of $1.90 per person per day. By October 2024, the institution reported again that 129 million Nigerians now live below the poverty line.
It is almost ironic that a plan designed to rescue 35 million from poverty has instead pushed 125 percent of that number deeper into destitution. This outcome, while disheartening, is hardly surprising to those familiar with Nigeria’s history of abandoned or poorly executed development plans.
These goals were intended to grow the economy by an average of 4.6 percent annually and raise the revenue-to-GDP ratio to 15 percent. However, four years later, based on World Bank data, the economy has grown by only 3.27 percent—well below the 4.6 percent target. BusinessDay analysis also shows that the average revenue-to-GDP ratio from 2023 to Q3 2024 is 9.14 percent, significantly short of the targeted 15 percent.
Source: BUSINESSDAY
