Hobnob News – The World Bank has projected a troubling rise in poverty across Nigeria, estimating an increase of 3.6 percentage points by 2027. This projection is contained in the latest Africa’s Pulse report, released during the ongoing Spring Meetings of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank in Washington, DC.
The report signals a bleak outlook for poverty reduction in Nigeria, despite modest gains in economic activities—especially within the non-oil sector during Q4 2024. It warns that Nigeria’s overdependence on natural resources and its economic fragility may continue to obstruct efforts to alleviate poverty.
According to the World Bank, Nigeria—alongside other resource-dependent and fragile nations in Sub-Saharan Africa, such as the Democratic Republic of Congo—is set to experience worsening poverty trends in contrast to non-resource-rich countries, which are likely to see more progress in poverty reduction.
“Poverty in resource-rich, fragile countries—including large economies like Nigeria—is projected to rise by 3.6 percentage points between 2022 and 2027,” the report states.
Sub-Saharan Africa remains the global epicenter of extreme poverty, with 80% of the world’s 695 million poorest individuals residing in the region in 2024. Half of the region’s 560 million extreme poor are concentrated in just four countries.
In contrast, South Asia accounts for 8%, East Asia and the Pacific 2%, the Middle East and North Africa 5%, and Latin America and the Caribbean just 3% of the global extreme poor population.
The report attributes the growing poverty in resource-rich countries to declining oil revenues and fragile fiscal systems. Meanwhile, non-resource-rich nations are capitalizing on strong agricultural commodity prices to drive growth, despite facing fiscal constraints.
“This trend reflects a longstanding pattern where resource wealth, coupled with fragility or conflict, leads to significantly higher poverty rates—averaging 46% in 2024, which is 13 percentage points higher than in more stable, resource-rich nations,” the World Bank added.
To reverse this trajectory, the Bank urges Nigeria and similar economies to prioritize fiscal reforms and cultivate stronger government-citizen fiscal relationships to enable sustainable, inclusive development and long-term poverty reduction.
