The Central
Bank of Nigeria (CBN) has assured Nigerians that the current recession they are
facing would end before the end of the year, even as it blamed
overdependence
on importation for the problem.
CBN
governor, Mr. Godwin Emefiele, at the weekend while delivering a lecture
entitled: “The Dilemma of Monetary Policy and Exchange Rate Management in a
Recession: Potential Options for Nigeria,” at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka
(UNN), explained that he was optimistic that with all the interventions of the
Federal Government, the CBN and other authorities, “the country will be out of
recession before the end of 2017.”
He stated
that no country of the world could have survived by the kind of importation of
foreign goods Nigeria experienced, stressing that Nigerians began to feel the
negative part of the system when there was not enough resources to sustain the
importation regime.
The event,
which featured distinguished awards to some eminent persons including the
President of Southeast, South-South Professionals, Mr. Emeka Ugwuoju, was the
second homecoming of the school’s Department of Economics.
According to
Emefiele who graduated from the University: “In January 2017, inflation was
18.8 per cent, it is now down to 16.24 per cent. Last quarter, which was fourth
quarter of 2016 growth, was negative 1.72 per cent. First quarter of 2017
growth had improved to negative 1.52 per cent.
“What that
means is that we have an improvement in growth by about 1.2 per cent. If we see
another 1.2 per cent growth in the second quarter we are out of recession.”
He noted
that with the enthusiasm shown by the Federal Government in the area of
agriculture, “with support for local farmers and private sector investments in agriculture,
I believe that barring any other shock the prices of foodstuff in the markets
will come down.”
The CBN
boss, expressed regrets that the country missed the opportunity of being a
great economy when it abandoned agriculture which was its backbone between
1960s and 1970s for oil.
“In those
good days the South East and South South were known for palm oil, the South
West for cocoa and the North for groundnut but with the advent of oil we
abandoned agriculture.’’
He noted
that the idea of importing all that the country consumes was responsible for
the current recession.“How do we justify the importation of items like apple,
cucumber and eggs?’’from South Africa; beef from Zambia and toothpicks from
China?
“These are
items we can locally produce and used money in importing these items to beef up
local industries that will in turn create employments for our youths.
“We must
take cognizance of the fact that imports are leakages to every economy.” The
CBN governor said the apex bank was aware of the pains Nigerians are going
through as a result of the economic recession and said this is the opportunity
needed to look inward to diversify the economy and come out of the recession
stronger.
The
Vice-Chancellor, Prof. Benjamin Ozumba, expressed appreciation for the governor
of the apex bank for accepting the invitation to deliver the lecture and
described the CBN governor as one of the best alumni of the university.Ozumba
said the importance of economics in any county could not be over-emphasis, the
decision of economists determines the progress or failure of any country.
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