By Anthony Areh
The Executive Secretary, Nigeria Investment Promotion Commission (NIPC), Yewande Sadiku, says Nigeria’s investment had been under pressure before and during coronavirus pandemic.
Sadiku said in Abuja that investments in Nigeria in 2020 and 2021 were also expected to come under some pressure on account of COVID-19.
“That is not unusual for Nigeria; it is downward pressure that is expected across market. In March it had been estimated that Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) inflow will fall by between 30 and 40 percent globally.
“In 2020/2021 if those updates are done now, the expectation is that the demand will be even lower,” she said.
The NIPC boss however noted that the pandemic had thrown up a number of opportunities which the commission was advocating for domestic investors in particular, to take advantage of those opportunities.
Sadiku reiterated that in spite of the contractions in the country’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP), some sectors of the economy had made significant improvement.
“Despite the contractions in GDP, there are a number of sectors that have done particularly well.
“The financial sector supported by technology grew by about 28 percent, Telecom grew by 18 percent and the like.
“This is despite a GDP contraction of about 6.1 percent,” the executive secretary added.
She said NIPC’s mandate was to encourage, promote and coordinate investment, adding that the commission would be glad to collaborate with government agencies based on its mandate to drive investments in the country.
