March 28, 2024

Minister of Budget and National Planning, Senator Udoma Udo Udoma, on Thursday reiterated Federal Government’s commitment to the implementation of the various strategies set out in the Economic Recovery and Growth Plan (ERGP), to address the five execution priorities of Macroeconomic Stabilization, Agriculture and Food Security, Transportation, Energy and Industrialization.

Senator Udoma who was addressing the Joint Planning Board/National Council on Development Planning (JPB/NCDP) meetings in Abeokuta, Ogun State, said with the faithful implementation of the Plan government will be able to deliver a resilient and more prosperous economy where ‘we grow what we eat and consume what we make’.

He noted that though the Plan was hailed within and outside the country as well designed to address the fundamental economic challenges of the country, there were some concerns expressed about implementation, given our past failures as a country to effectively implement previous plans. He assured that the Buhari Administration is determined to properly implement the Plan. Already Government is encouraged by the achievements recorded so far in the implementation of the ERGP.

Explaining that the ERGP was conceived as a comprehensive medium term plan to address the fundamental problems of the country and place the economy on the path of diversified, sustainable and inclusive growth, he stated that many innovations are being introduced to achieve faster results.

Pointing specifically to the success recorded through the ERGP Focus Labs, held early this year, in driving the objectives of the Plan in some key sectors of the economy, the Minister said more of such innovations will help to fast-track implementation of the Plan. He was hopeful that the JPB/NCDP meetings will generate new ideas that will help the Plan implementation.

The annual JPB/NCDP meetings is a platform for State Commissioners, Permanent Secretaries, and other relevant stakeholders to discuss with each other about the Nigerian economy and keep abreast of developments by hearing from development experts on topical economic issues. The theme for this year’s meeting is “Accelerating implementation of the Economic Recovery and Growth Plan: the role of stakeholders.”

He explained that the theme was chosen to focus attention on what can be done to accelerate the momentum of the current economic revival as there is a need to quicken the growth of the economy. He reminded the participants that the ERGP was a live and dynamic plan.

He was therefore optimistic that contributions at this year’s meetings will be useful for the mid-term review of the ERGP which the Ministry is currently undertaking.

 

The Minister said that he found it encouraging that the implementation of the ERGP was already yielding positive results. “Not only is Nigeria out of recession, the country is beginning to grow again particularly in the non-oil sector. The latest NBS numbers revealed that the Non-Oil sector grew by 2.05% in Q2, 2018. Other economic indices are also improving. Inflation rate has shown consistent decline since December 2016, declining from 18.55% at that time to 11.14% in July 2018.”

He also pointed to the fact that the external reserves have nearly doubled since September 2016, from $23.81 billion to $46.37 billion by mid-August, 2018; Exchange rate gap has narrowed and confidence in the economy is returning; Capital inflows have risen from $710 million in the first quarter of 2016 to $5.5 billion by the second quarter of this year and Nigeria’s stock market ended 2017 as one of the best performing in the world.

While also mentioning that between 2016 and 2017, our exports have grown by 59.5%, from N8, 527 billion in 2016 to N13, 598 billion in 2017, he added that trade balance has grown from a deficit of N290.1 billion in 2016 to peak at a surplus of N4, 035.5 billion in 2017.

These, he said, are as a result of what government has been doing in the past three years, which among others included ensuring alignment between the Medium Term Fiscal Frameworks (MTFF), the annual budgets and the ERGP; and the adoption of the Zero-based budgeting system which has helped in scrutinising public expenditure estimates at the micro levels to ensure effective deployment of our limited resources to areas and sectors with the greatest development impact.

Others include substantial investments in power and transport infrastructure, capital provisions in agriculture, introduction of the Social Intervention Programme (SIP), measures to improve health and educational infrastructure, introduction of measures to increase revenues as well as commitment to improve the business environment which resulted in an improved ranking in the World Bank ease of doing business index, from 169 in 2016 to 145 in 2017.

Acknowledging however that there is still more work to be done, the Minister told representatives of State Governments and other development partners at the gathering that there is an urgent need to intensify work on the implementation of the Plan to achieve the Nigeria of our dream.

The Minister noted that since the adoption of the ERGP, the JPB/NCDP has been utilised to examine ways of facilitating the delivery of its objectives and urged further commitment from all stakeholders so that we can work together to ensure that the Plan achieves its set goals and targets. “We must intensify the work we are doing in the implementation of the ERGP. We must continuously introduce new ways of doing things better”, he said.

The Vice President, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo, who declared the NCDP meeting open, agreed with the Minister that notwithstanding the successes recorded so far in the implementation of the ERGP, the Government is determined to do even more; adding that the realisation of the goals of the ERGP will require the active participation of the sub-national governments.

 

“At the Federal level, our commitment is never in doubt. We will definitely not relent until the majority of the citizens feel the impact of our efforts,” he assured.

Prof. Osinbajo who was represented by the Budget and National Planning Minister, Senator Udoma, commended States that have already adopted a number of the initiatives being promoted in the Plan, and called on other States that have not done so to key into the implementation of the Plan because it was the only way we can together guarantee a better future.

The gathering was also addressed by the governor of the host State, Senator Ibikunle Amosun, and the Minister of Labour and Employment, Senator Chris Ngige.

 

 

 

 

32 thoughts on “FG committed to fast-tracking ERGP implementation

  1. We are a group of volunteers and opening a new scheme in our
    community. Your site provided us with valuable information to work on. You have done
    a formidable job and our entire community will be grateful to you.

  2. I simply want to say I am just beginner to weblog and definitely enjoyed you’re web site. Probably I’m want to bookmark your blog . You amazingly come with wonderful stories. Thank you for sharing your web page.

  3. When I initially commented I clicked the “Notify me when new comments are added” checkbox and now each time a comment is added I get three e-mails with the same comment.
    Is there any way you can remove people from that service?
    Bless you!

  4. With havin so much content and articles do you ever run into any problems of plagorism or copyright violation? My website has a lot of completely unique content I’ve either
    created myself or outsourced but it seems a
    lot of it is popping it up all over the web without my agreement.
    Do you know any solutions to help prevent content from being stolen? I’d certainly appreciate it.

  5. May I simply say what a comfort to find a person that actually knows
    what they are talking about online. You actually know how to
    bring a problem to light and make it important.

    A lot more people have to read this and understand this side of your
    story. It’s surprising you aren’t more popular because you most certainly possess
    the gift.

  6. I’m not sure where you’re getting your information, but good topic.
    I needs to spend some time learning more or understanding more.
    Thanks for excellent info I was looking for this information for my mission.

  7. Hello there! This article couldn’t be written much
    better! Looking at this post reminds me of my previous roommate!
    He constantly kept referring to this. I will
    send this post to him. Fairly certain he’ll have got a good read.
    I appreciate you for sharing!

    Feel free to surf to my website … coin pouch insert

  8. Please let me know if you’re looking for a writer for your weblog.
    You have some really great articles and I believe I would be a good asset.

    If you ever want to take some of the load off, I’d really like to write some
    articles for your blog in exchange for a link back to mine.
    Please shoot me an e-mail if interested. Kudos!

    my web-site – wallet size notebook

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *