Nigeria’s digital economy to generate $88 billion, create three million jobs

25 Apr 2017
Financial Nigeria

Summary

Enelamah said the ministry is developing the “Smart Nigeria Digital Economy Project” to solve efficiency problems, improve competitiveness, and foster technology development and innovation.

Nigerian Minister of Industry, Trade and Investment, Okechukwu Enelamah

Financial services in the Nigerian digital sector have the potential to generate $88 billion and create three million new jobs over the next 10 years, according to the Ministry of Industry, Trade and Investment. The ministry stated this at the first Ministerial Meeting of the Friends of E-Commerce for Development (FED), which held today on the sidelines of the United Nations Conference for Trade and Development (UNCTAD) E-Commerce week in Geneva, Switzerland.

Minister of Industry, Trade and Investment, Okechukwu Enelamah, who led the Nigerian delegation to Geneva, said opportunities in the digital economy are in digital accounts, payments, mobile money, health and educational services and other sectors of the economy.

The meeting was attended by ministers from Nigeria, Mexico, Kenya, Argentina, Colombia, Sri Lanka, Uruguay, Chile, Costa Rica and Pakistan, under the auspices of Friends of E-Commerce for Development.  They resolved to put forward a policy agenda to bridge the digital divide and provide development solutions in their countries in the long term.

Enelamah said the ministry is developing the “Smart Nigeria Digital Economy Project” to solve efficiency problems, improve competitiveness, and foster technology development and innovation.

“The Smart Nigeria Digital Economy Project is Nigeria’s response to an area of intense economic and technological activity by Nigerian youths, where there is a growing pool of talent,” the Minister said. “It is a sector of the economy where the private sector already has ownership. The role of government would therefore be to ensure a sound pro-competitive regulatory environment and hardware infrastructure to foster rapid growth of this area.”

He emphasised the importance of enabling Nigeria’s digital economy, saying that there are currently 150 million active mobile users in a country of 170 million people, with more than 60% connected to the internet. There are about 17 million Facebook subscribers, apart from numerous tech start-ups and young people who are developing apps to solve problems and spur economic growth.

Given Nigeria’s emerging digital economy, the country's Chief Negotiator, Ambassador Chiedu Osakwe, was invited by the office of the UNCTAD Secretary-General to deliver the Keynote Address at the UNCTAD E-Commerce week session on E-commerce in Africa. In his address titled: “Trumping Timidity: The Importance of Audacity in the Digital Economy”, Ambassador Osakwe urged African countries to integrate digital economy strategies into domestic structural reforms for diversification, modernization and growth.

“Africa needed to be offensive in this area, acting innovatively, purposefully and expeditiously” because the gains and development yields are considerable as evidenced by the Nigerian example.


Other Photos/Videos

Advertisement