Chimara BygoldThe Bankers Committee in it’s two-day meeting that ended Wednesday afternoon shared ideas on new ways to contribute to the growth of the Nigerian economy while making it more resilient to withstand probable shocks that may be occasioned by the latest COVID-19 variant known as Omicron.
The Committee comprises chief executives of Nigerian banks, other financial institutions and the directors of different departments of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), with the CBN governor as chairman.
Addressing participants at the retreat, CBN governor Mr. Godwin Emefiele recalled that the global economy and indeed the Nigerian economy faced unprecedented challenges in 2020, which led to a significant downturn in global growth last witnessed during the Great Depression of 1929.
To contain the downturn and drive the recovery of Nigeria’s economy, he said the monetary and fiscal authorities deployed a series of policy measures that have aided the rebound in Nigeria’s growth, beginning in the fourth quarter of 2020.
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On the back of this recovery, the CBN remains focused on strengthening the fundamentals of the Nigerian economy, by using the most innovative and sometimes extraordinary measures to diversify the economy, boost domestic productivity, and “reduce our import dependence,” he said. According to the governor, though the economy is recovering, growth remains fragile and below potential.
“As a result, continued implementation of efforts to boost credit to productive sectors is required to sustain the recovery, quicken growth, and improve the livelihood of Nigerians.
“With population growth at about 2.7 percent annually, it is important that we continue to deploy measures that will enable our economy to attain faster and balanced growth rates of over 5 percent on an annual basis,” he told participants.
According to him, every crisis provides its own opportunities, therefore, “I believe that this crisis provided an opportunity for us to build a stronger and more resilient economy,” Emefiele stated.
It is in this regard, he added, that the theme of this year’s retreat “Building resilience for economic growth,” is both timely and appropriate.”As the 12th in the series of annual brainstorming sessions, this Retreat is another occasion to critically review strategic economic and financial developments.
” It is an opportunity to find ways to strengthen and re-position our country for unforeseen challenges. We must aim for not only a fast, balanced, and sustainable recovery, but also ensure that through improved access to finance, the fundamentals of our economy are strengthened,” he stated. He said the committee has come together because from the ashes of COVID-19 pandemic, comes a wonderful light, an enduring hope, a therapeutic healing, and a resilient people.
Given the mandate to promote a sound monetary and financial system, and working with the fiscal authorities, Emefueke emphasized that the CBN took unprecedented measures to contain the effects of the pandemic on Nigeria’s economy and spurred increased productivity in key sectors.
The CBN he disclosed, collaborated with the fiscal authorities to formulate strong policy support measures through the Economic Sustainability Plan (ESP) to restore stability and catalyze growth. In support of the recovery efforts, the Bank deployed more than N3.5 trillion, which is about 4.1 per cent of Nigeria’s GDP, to support critical sectors including agriculture, manufacturing, healthcare, electricity, and construction.
CBN created a N400 billion Targeted Credit Facility for households and small and medium enterprises. Of this, nearly N370 billion has been released to over 800,000 beneficiaries among other intervention programs. Emefiele added that in furtherance of these efforts and given current global realities, “I enjoin and challenge this Bankers’ Committee Retreat to focus on fashioning out strategies to fortify the fabric of the Nigerian economy, boost growth and engender resilience, especially to exogenous shocks.
“To spur growth, we will need to assess policy measures that can address subsisting imbalances and constraints to finance,” he said.Also speaking, Lagos State Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu agreed with the participants on the importance of focusing on resilience of the economy.
He urged the committee to join the government in pursuing economic diversification more vigorously, help in promoting the Small and Medium-scale Enterprises (SMEs) sector, de-emphasize mono-product economy and support the growth of the ICT sector.
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