2019: W’Bank reviews downward Nigeria’s GDP growth rate forecast to 2.1%

he World Bank Group has predicted that Nigeria’s real Gross Domestic Product (GDP) growth rate will be 2.1 percent for 2019 as against 2.2percnet it had predicted for the country last year.
It instead predicted a 2.2percent growth rate for Nigeria in 2020 and 2.4 percent for 2021.
The Bank in its June 2019 Global Economic Prospects released Wednesday said Nigeria’s economy slowed to 2.1percent in the first quarter of this year as indicated by the statistics published by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) in May.
The Bank’s report which was titled Heightened Tensions, Subdued Investment’, growth rates in developing countries are expected to rise to six percent in 2020, higher than 5.4 percent this year.
But it said this will still not reduce poverty in these countries.
According to the report, “While a number of low-income countries progressed to middle income status between 2000 and 2018, the remaining low-income countries face steeper challenges to achieving similar progress. Many are poorer than the countries that made the leap to higher income levels and are fragile, disadvantaged by geography and heavily reliant on agriculture.
“In 2020, growth in South Africa is anticipated to rise to 1.5 per cent; growth in Angola is anticipated to pick up to 2.9 per cent; and growth in Nigeria is anticipated to edge up to 2.2 per cent in 2020.
“Regional growth is expected to accelerate to 3.3 per cent in 2020, assuming that investor sentiment toward some of the large economies of the region improves, that oil production will recover in large exporters, and that robust growth in non-resource-intensive economies will be underpinned by continued strong agricultural production and sustained public investment.
“While per capita GDP is expected to rise in the region, it will nevertheless be insufficient to significantly reduce poverty.”