EDITORIAL: Saving Nigerians from the multi-poverty trap
The latest report from the National Bureau of Poverty Statistics offers a sobering reality about life in Nigeria. He claims that more citizens are mired in the quagmire of deprivation than the 86 million people previously shown in the world clock of poverty. Coming at the twilight of President Muhammadu Buhari's rule and the implementation of a series of poverty reduction policies, it calls for a reality check on the effectiveness of existing policy tools.
Specifically, a total of 133 million Nigerians, or 63% of the population, are plagued by multidimensional poverty. Based on a wide range of indices such as health, education, standard of living, work and shock, the survey exposes the underside of governance in the country. The evaluation was conducted between November 2021 and February 2022; and it involved 56,000 households spread across the 36 states of the federation, including Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory. The results underscore a notorious fact - that the North bears much of the burden of poverty in Nigeria, with the North East recording 76.5%, the North West - 75.8%, the North Center - 66.3 %, South-South – 62.6%, South-East – 49% and South-West – 40%.
In all regions, women figure prominently among the most affected categories. Unsurprisingly, children make up more than half of the affected population. As expected, 72% of Nigeria's poverty victims are found in rural areas, compared to 42% in urban centres. The NBS has partnered with the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), UNICEF and the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative (OPHI) to produce this eye-opening report. The dimensions explored to arrive at the Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) include nutrition, food, insecurity, health care, water, water reliability, sanitation, construction materials construction, cooking fuel, assets, unemployment and underemployment.
The story of the past two decades is that the poverty of leadership at the federal and sub-national levels has deprived the people of Nigeria of good policies implemented that would have alleviated poverty. Nigeria, for example, failed to achieve the global Millennium Development Goals in 2015, which was a United Nations program, the first two pillars of which were the eradication of extreme poverty and hunger. , and the achievement of universal primary education. Food security is a major concern in the country. Farmers have deserted their farmlands in many parts of the North due to the Boko Haram insurgency and killings by bandits and terrorists. No less than 1.9 million displaced people in the region live on charity, suffer from malnutrition and face serious health problems. The crisis is compounded by the recent disastrous floods, which pushed food inflation to 23.72% in October.
An infographic showing the poverty rate by regions.A country supposedly committed to universal primary education (UPE) has withdrawn the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) charges against a former governor for allegedly stealing...
The latest report from the National Bureau of Poverty Statistics offers a sobering reality about life in Nigeria. He claims that more citizens are mired in the quagmire of deprivation than the 86 million people previously shown in the world clock of poverty. Coming at the twilight of President Muhammadu Buhari's rule and the implementation of a series of poverty reduction policies, it calls for a reality check on the effectiveness of existing policy tools.
Specifically, a total of 133 million Nigerians, or 63% of the population, are plagued by multidimensional poverty. Based on a wide range of indices such as health, education, standard of living, work and shock, the survey exposes the underside of governance in the country. The evaluation was conducted between November 2021 and February 2022; and it involved 56,000 households spread across the 36 states of the federation, including Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory. The results underscore a notorious fact - that the North bears much of the burden of poverty in Nigeria, with the North East recording 76.5%, the North West - 75.8%, the North Center - 66.3 %, South-South – 62.6%, South-East – 49% and South-West – 40%.
In all regions, women figure prominently among the most affected categories. Unsurprisingly, children make up more than half of the affected population. As expected, 72% of Nigeria's poverty victims are found in rural areas, compared to 42% in urban centres. The NBS has partnered with the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), UNICEF and the Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative (OPHI) to produce this eye-opening report. The dimensions explored to arrive at the Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) include nutrition, food, insecurity, health care, water, water reliability, sanitation, construction materials construction, cooking fuel, assets, unemployment and underemployment.
The story of the past two decades is that the poverty of leadership at the federal and sub-national levels has deprived the people of Nigeria of good policies implemented that would have alleviated poverty. Nigeria, for example, failed to achieve the global Millennium Development Goals in 2015, which was a United Nations program, the first two pillars of which were the eradication of extreme poverty and hunger. , and the achievement of universal primary education. Food security is a major concern in the country. Farmers have deserted their farmlands in many parts of the North due to the Boko Haram insurgency and killings by bandits and terrorists. No less than 1.9 million displaced people in the region live on charity, suffer from malnutrition and face serious health problems. The crisis is compounded by the recent disastrous floods, which pushed food inflation to 23.72% in October.
An infographic showing the poverty rate by regions.A country supposedly committed to universal primary education (UPE) has withdrawn the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) charges against a former governor for allegedly stealing...
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