IMF/World Bank to Nigeria, others: Adopt country-specific measures to address ailing economy

Nigerian delegation to this year’s IMF/World Bank meetings held several meetings with World Bank/IMF Officials, colleagues from across the globe and institutional investors that picked interest in Nigeria. The delegation led by CBN Governor, Mr. Godwin Emefiele and Permanent Secretary, Ministry of Finance, Mrs A. M. Daniel-Nwaobia had back to back meetings. At the end, they explained what transpired inside the various plenary sessions. Excerpts Introductory remarks These meetings are biannual statutory meetings of the Finance ministers and Central Bank Governors, from over one hundred and eighty countries of the world. We held meetings with some international banks who are thinking of developing some relationship with the Central Bank as well as Ministry of Finance and the Federal Government. We also held meetings with some rating agencies to provide insight into the Nigeria economy and what we are doing to support and grow the Nigerian economy. Global economy projected growth Basically what you can say are some of the main issues facing the global economy is that the world finance leaders as well as the Governors of central Banks came to the conclusion to the point where the global growth was further revised downward, when the Spring Meetings were held in April, 2015, global growth was projected at 3.8 percent. The Growth was revised downward to 3.1 per cent. For Africa economies in April when we held the Spring Meetings, global growth was projected at over 5 per cent but at this meeting, global growth for 2015 has been revised downward to 3.5 per cent and for 2016 growth for Africa has been projected at 4.2 per cent. What this tells us is that the slow down as a result of drop in commodity prices or the end of the quantitative easing to the extent that the United States is already contemplating raising rates through assets as well as the geo-political situation has affected many economies to the point that they are slowing down and in some cases some of the economies have also gone into recession. Countries specific advice The meeting also concentrated on what can be down to revise the trend and what kind of specific solutions can be provided for the different economies to turn their situations around. Basically, we find that for those economies that are really affected by the drop in commodity prices, and in this case Nigeria, basic solutions suggestions that came up were first that there is the need for Nigeria to diversify its economy in this case from oil or from commodity prices. This we are already doing and we seize this opportunity to thank Mr. President for the support he has given for most of the intervention that he has made in diversifying the economy away from oil. That has given credence to what we are doing to catalyse the Nigerian economy by making available intervention funds to support agriculture, micro small and medium enterprises, and other various interventions, that we are putting in place to support the Nigerian economy.