The World Bank has advised the Federal Government to implement reforms that protect the poorest in the country against rising inflation.
The bank also advised the government to boost livelihoods of all Nigerians through more productive work, which it said is key to reversing high levels of poverty.
The World Bank stated this in its latest April 2025 Poverty and Equity Brief for Nigeria, which was obtained on Monday.
It had, earlier last month, in its Africa’s Pulse report, declared that more Nigerians would become poor over the next five years, citing Nigeria’s structural economic weaknesses, dependence on oil revenues and national fragility as key barriers to meaningful poverty reduction.
To alleviate the inflationary effects of recent reforms on the poor, the government has launched temporary cash transfers to reach 15 million households; however, roll-out has been slow, the bank said.
Upon assumption of office on May 29, 2023, President Bola Tinubu’s administration has implemented bold economic reforms such as the removal of fuel subsidies and floating of the naira.
The reforms have spiked inflation rates.
Nigeria’s annual inflation rose slightly to 24.23% in March 2025, from 23.18% in the prior month, which was the softest since June 2023. Food inflation, the largest component of the inflation basket, remained elevated but eased to 21.79% from 23.51% in the prior month. The core inflation, which excludes the prices of volatile agricultural products and energy, quickened to 24.43%, from 23.01% in the previous month. Monthly, consumer prices rose by 3.90% in March, accelerating from 2.04% in February.
The World Bank said, “Multiple shocks in a context of high economic insecurity have deepened and broadened poverty. Since 2018/19, an additional 42 million people fell into poverty, so that more than half of all Nigerians (54 per cent) are estimated to live in poverty in 2024, based on World Bank projections.
Although recent macroeconomic reforms have begun to stabilise the economy, inflation remains high, dampening consumer demand and continuing to undermine the purchasing power of Nigerians. Labour incomes have not kept up with inflation, pushing many Nigerians, particularly in urban areas, into poverty.
“Strengthening of the social protection system with a focus on building resilience and enabling human capital investments could be funded through recent fiscal savings from the Premium Motor Spirit (PMS)reform.”
This, the WB said, will be key to help mitigate the impact of future shocks, and allow households to make necessary investments into human capital to avoid inter-generational transmission of poverty.
“These short-term interventions need to be complemented by economic diversification that grows the non-oil sector and creates private sector jobs, together with investments into public services, especially in health, education, and infrastructure. Improving the effectiveness and efficiency of public investments is especially important in the context of limited fiscal space.”
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Based on the most recent official household survey data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), 30.9 per cent of Nigerians lived below the international extreme poverty line of $2.15 per person per day (2017 PPP) in 2018/19 before the COVID-19 pandemic, according to the report.
“Nigeria remains spatially unequal. The poverty rate in northern geopolitical zones was 46.5 per cent in 2018/19, compared with 13.5 per cent for southern ones.
