Minister of State for Budget and National Planning Clem Ikanade Agba has said the federal government expects the injection of about N2 trillion stimulus into the economy in response to the COVID-19 pandemic and the fall in oil prices.
He spoke Tuesday at a webinar on “Citizens Dialogue Session on Government Fiscal Policy Decisions to the Fall in Oil Prices and the COVID-19 Pandemic” organised by the Federal Ministry of Finance, Budget and National Planning and supported by Partnership to Engage, Reform and Learn (PERL) and the UK Department for International Development (DFID).
The Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, Hajiya Zainab Ahmed, participated in the virtual meeting.
Agba, in response to a question on what the economic sustainability committee under the chair of Hajiya Ahmed was doing to deal with the pandemic and the fall in crude oil prices, said the committee had outlined five broad policy objectives with which to deal with the problems.
After highlighting the objectives, he said, “All in all, when everything is put together, both government funding and the funds we are expected to get from the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Banks of Industry and other multilateral agencies and grants that we are receiving, we expect to get a stimulus of about N2 trillion going into the economy.”
“We are fighting a dual pandemic, both health and economic pandemic. It is no longer a secret that government revenues have collapsed and oil prices have fallen; demand for oil has also fallen; there is a glut in supply. And, this is generally affecting manufacturing and other non-oil sectors.
“So, for the Economic Sustainability Committee, we had basically looked at some five broad policy objectives. One is, how do we safe lives in response to the pandemic and support the Presidential Task Force?
“How do we take care of the vulnerabilities that we have in the system? How do we keep our economy off the ravages of this pandemic? That is to say, we know we are going into recession. How do we make it short-lived and shallow?
“How do we ensure that there is quick recovery, and that the recovery is not U-shaped or V-shaped? How do we build resilience going forward? What do we need to do to build the foundation for a long-term growth?
“So, basically, the committee has been looking at how to build a resilient health system, provide funding for basic health infrastructure and operations, both from government and also from loans which base is on a fund set up by government both led by the commercial banks through the CBN,” the minister said.
On other measures targeted at recovering the economy, he said: “We are also looking at how to create jobs. First, how do we protect the jobs that are already existing and how do we create additional jobs within the next twelve months?
“We are looking at doing massive funding in rural growth, first to ensure that the food that will be produced can get to the market. The Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development would be working with the sub-nationals to help assist in the acquisition of land for private investors in order to increase that focus on food production; easy access to land acquisition and, then, funding, of course, in this area will also be coming from the commercial banks supported by CBN and we will ensure that government gives the guarantee to take off the production in the event that the market is bloated.”
