Population of poor expected to hit 89.5 million
*Poverty worsening as population growth outpaces GDP
*Over 3 million more Nigerians join poverty rank.
Nigeria’s misery index is set for a spike, with more than three million people joining the population of poor Nigerians, at the backdrop of the projected contraction of the economy as measured by the Gross Domestic Product, GDP, and the population growth rate.
The Federal Government had projected that the economy (GDP) will contract by 4.4 per cent GDP by end of 2020, down from growth of 2.27 per cent in 2019, due mainly to fallouts of the COVID-19 pandemic.
On the other hand the population is set to grow by 3.5 per cent, reaching about 218.3 million at year-end, though some socio-economic analysts told Vanguard this is a conservative estimate.
The decline in GDP growth rate may result in loss of about N3.1 trillion to the population’s purchasing power which will equally bring down the per capita GDP to about N312,697, about eight perc ent drop from the 2019 figure of N337,550.
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