{"id":31846,"date":"2021-07-04T13:53:12","date_gmt":"2021-07-04T12:53:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thefreezonechannel.com\/?p=31846"},"modified":"2021-10-07T00:43:17","modified_gmt":"2021-10-07T00:43:17","slug":"expert-advises-nigeria-others-to-implement-single-currency","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thefreezonechannel.com\/old\/expert-advises-nigeria-others-to-implement-single-currency\/","title":{"rendered":"Expert advises Nigeria,  others to implement single currency"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>An Economist, Prof. Akpan Ekpo, has called on West African countries to fast track the launch of a single currency that would boost trade and economic growth in the region.<br \/>\nEkpo , a former Director General of the West African Institute for Financial and Economic Management (WAIFEM), said  on Sunday in Lagos that what the region needed for the take-off was only \u201ca political will\u201d.<br \/>\nHe added that once the currency was launched, economies would find its place and other players would follow.<br \/>\nThe experts reaction came on the background of the new road map agreed upon by the heads of state of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) to launch the Eco single currency in 2027.<br \/>\nRecalled that the planned currency which ought to have begun in 2020, was derailed by the Coronavirus pandemic; member states have also been unable to meet the convergence criteria for the launch.<br \/>\nThe criteria include inflation, debt-to-GDP ratio, budget deficits and their financing, reserves and exchange rate stability.<br \/>\nAccording to Ekpo, if they wait for all the countries to meet to the criteria, there will never be a single currency because countries met it at different times and most times not all of the important criteria.<br \/>\nEkpo said, \u201cThere is what is called `point convergence\u2019, if you let two or three countries who are big in the region like Nigeria, Ghana, Senegal and Cote d\u2019lvoire to jump-start it, if they have the `political will\u2019 to do so, it will solve the problem.<br \/>\n\u201cLook at Nigeria\u2019s inflation rate; it\u2019s almost 18 per cent now, food inflation 20 per cent. So, the problem is, do they have the political will to do that?<br \/>\n\u201cFor instance, the Francophone countries CFA are tied to the Euro and all of them almost meet the criteria, if they disentangle their money from Euro, they will have high inflation rate for example.<br \/>\n\u201cI am happy that Nigeria is not rushing into it because if they convert now, Nigeria will bear the burden for all other countries,\u2019\u2019 he said.<\/p>\n<!--themify_builder_content-->\n<div id=\"themify_builder_content-31846\" data-postid=\"31846\" class=\"themify_builder_content themify_builder_content-31846 themify_builder tf_clear\">\n    <\/div>\n<!--\/themify_builder_content-->\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>An Economist, Prof. Akpan Ekpo, has called on West African countries to fast track the launch of a single currency that would boost trade and economic growth in the region. Ekpo , a former Director General of the West African Institute for Financial and Economic Management (WAIFEM), said on Sunday in Lagos that what the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":1210,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[125,126],"tags":[815,781],"class_list":["post-31846","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-finance-money","category-trade-and-industry","tag-currency","tag-single-currency","has-post-title","has-post-date","has-post-category","has-post-tag","has-post-comment","has-post-author",""],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v23.7 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Expert advises Nigeria, others to implement single currency - The Freezone Channel<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/thefreezonechannel.com\/old\/expert-advises-nigeria-others-to-implement-single-currency\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Expert advises Nigeria, others to implement single currency - The Freezone Channel\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"An Economist, Prof. Akpan Ekpo, has called on West African countries to fast track the launch of a single currency that would boost trade and economic growth in the region. 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