There are indications that Nigeria’s poverty level may have further deteriorated as the latest reports of the Nigeria Employers Consultative Association, NECA, shows a 10 percentage point rise in the number of the extreme poor in the country against the 2019 report of the National Bureau of Statistics, NBS.

NECA’s report says that the number of citizens in extreme poverty now stands at an estimated 102 million, representing 50 per cent of the Nigeria’s estimated population of about 205 million, as against the 40 per cent reported by NBS in October last year.

This comes at the backdrop of the World Bank forecast that global extreme poverty is expected to rise in 2020 for the first time in over 20 years as the disruption of the COVID-19 pandemic compounds the forces of conflict and climate change, which were already slowing down progress in poverty reduction efforts around the world.