Sanusi: 70% of Nigerians are very poor

About 70 per cent of Nigerians are currently living below poverty line, the governor of Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Sanusi Lamido Sanusi said yesterday.

Current figures from the National Population Commission (NPC) put Nigeria’s population at about 150 million, and 70 per cent of this figure is 105 million.

The poverty ration was previously put at 54 per cent.

Speaking at the 5th Annual Microfinance Conference and Entrepreneurship Awards in Abuja, Sanusi said the scenario is unacceptable because it poses challenges to economic growth and development.

He said: “The number of people living below poverty line has increased to about 70 per cent. The scenario is unacceptable to CBN because the trickledown effect is low and it may take longer time than anticipated.

“There is little reason to believe that this wider diversion can be narrowed without much intensive effort.”

Majority of the poor people reside in rural areas and cut across youth, women and elderly people. It is estimated that 12 million out of the 150 million Nigerians are unemployed, youth and women form the chunk of this figures and majority of them lack access to credit facility.

“You would all appreciate that lack of access to financial services cause serious challenges to national economic growth and development,” Sanusi said.

He said the greatest challenge is to address the constraints that exclude people from full participation in financial sector. “Together we can make a financial sector that improve peoples’ lives,” the CBN governor said.

The financially excluded people in Nigeria are 46.3 per cent of the population and there is low level of bank penetration in the country.

The 24 commercial banks have 5789 branches as at September 2010, which when added to 815 MFBs, amounted to 6605 branches.

The challenge of financial exclusion in Nigeria implies that the target people are sparsely located with poor infrastructure. They lack awareness, have low income, are socially excluded and are distant from bank branches.

They are faced with cumbersome documentation procedure at banks, unsuitable products, high transaction cost and difficulty in proven identity.

“Empowering these segments of population is a sine quanon to enhancing economic growth and development. CBN has taken steps to enhance financial inclusiveness,” Sanusi said.

He said there is increasing need to devise more appropriate mechanism to deliver services to the disadvantaged and low income earners, who are made up of farmers, women, unemployed school by leavers, social excluded people and the aged population.

According to statistic, 49.9 percent of youth within the age of 15 and 24 years residing in the urban areas have no job while 39.6 percent of their counterparts in rural areas are also not employed.

Figures from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) put the number of unemployed women in the urban areas at 22 per cent and those in the rural areas at 24 per cent.

---

Posted: at 21-01-2011 12:04 PM (13 years ago) | Addicted Hero

Thank you my brother

---

Posted: at 22-01-2011 12:12 PM (13 years ago) | Addicted Hero

ASKING UNREASONABLE QUESTIONS......

---

Posted: at 22-01-2011 06:29 PM (13 years ago) | Hero

i appreciate and commend reasonable and right-on-point posters like this. this is d kind of issue we are meant to be discussing here and not some unreasonable cock n bull stories. Now that we know that our economy is fallen and not far frm shattering, what is d next move? though we have limited power over dis issue but at d same time , as election is fast approaching, it will do a lot good than harm if we all can join hands and vote most, if not all, the bad eggs out. i am fond of using the United States as en example, if anyone, as at 5 yrs ago, said a black man wld rule USA ,the most powerful country in the world, he/she wld have been stoned to death if i am not exaggerating. but alas! what happened? Change came, change won, and change is ruling. i strongly believe the same can happen in Nigeria. its all about the majority standing up to their rights...

Posted: at 22-01-2011 09:30 PM (13 years ago) | Upcoming

too long.

Posted: at 22-01-2011 09:41 PM (13 years ago) | Upcoming

so what is the nest step

Posted: at 22-01-2011 10:03 PM (13 years ago) | Gistmaniac

deffenitly if not that many pple , i meant large number of nigerian embarked in personl business, pple moved abroad for greener pasture,i may quote that the 70 percent said here is defualted or wrong. lets think about it that we should be talking about 90 percent cos the only pple living gud in nigeria re the top government  pple. but then , i thanked the CBN Governor for comprehensively bringing this to notice,  still then the ball is in government court to  make changes in the country so that life can be easy for pple.and also pple need to put in their own efforts to archieve a benefitable goal for example, coming out to register for voters card,voten when due time,asking nd knowing ur rights,etc

Posted: at 22-01-2011 10:16 PM (13 years ago) | Gistmaniac

70% of nigerians are currently living below poverty,is not something new.how can nigeria improve ,when the leaders are only interested on their own selfish interest huh!.all they do is to fight each other for power& wealth, without even care about it citizens.change can only start from the top (serious commitment)cuz you and i can not make a significant change no matter how we try.is a pity from a country with such huge amount of natural resources cannot even boost for anything..shame on you our leaders,imagine 102 millions living below poverty level.in other words $1 per day.hmmm LORD HAVE MERCY on the vulnerable ones.

Posted: at 22-01-2011 10:47 PM (13 years ago) | Gistmaniac

i agree to wat u said bt u made a statement which is a total fallacy to me.."change can only start frm d top". we wont move an inch forward if we continue to hold steadfast to dis ideology. change starts from every individual. the moment each n everyone of us accept d responsibilty to be an agent of change, i bet it wont take long b4 we celebrate a new Nigeria. change starts frm u and i. it starts frm d simple step of doing wat is right, e.g voting, enlightening other pple with d slightest opportunity, efforts to earn wat we worth( not a 100L student dreaming to own a 2011 lexus car), praying for our country, be positive towards our fellow citizen e,t,c

Posted: at 23-01-2011 12:16 AM (13 years ago) | Upcoming

i understand u perfectly bt in reality as u ve said, do u want to compare d action n stupidity of 1% of Nigeria's population to the effect of change powerered by 25% of d population? it may sound crazy bt trust me, d day we cease to be scared of them is d day we  r going to turn d table around. our main problem in Nigeria is we can talk, bt we cant take action

Posted: at 23-01-2011 01:30 AM (13 years ago) | Upcoming