The International Finance Corporation (IFC) has stated that its $2 billion investment portfolio in Nigeria is the second largest in Africa.
IFC’s Regional Vice President for Africa, Sergio Pimenta, who disclosed this in his keynote address at the BOI-IFC Conference on Empowering Futures in Lagos, stressed that the investments are concentrated across trade finance, manufacturing, financial markets, and infrastructure.
He added that IFC’s strategic objectives in Nigeria are meant to support diversified growth, enhancing inclusion, and promoting sustainability and job creation.
He stated that the Nigerian financial sector has a key role to play in supporting trade, financial inclusion and access to finance for MSMEs.
Speaking on the nation’s infrastructure gap, he said Nigeria’s rapidly growing population—projected to nearly double to 400 million by 2050 coupled with urbanisation underscores the urgent need for infrastructure development.
“Estimates suggest that infrastructure deficits already cost Nigeria about 4 percent of GDP growth annually. Therefore, it is imperative to work together to close infrastructure gaps, which are impeding private sector growth and overall economic development,” he advised.
He also pointed out the need for Nigeria to invest in agribusiness, saying primary agriculture is a cornerstone of Nigeria’s economy, contributing to 23‐24 per cent of GDP, and employing 36 per cent of the labour force, the largest across all sectors of the economy, but bemoaned that Nigeria is still a net importer of food for about $10 billion.
On his part, the Managing Director of Bank of Industry, BoI, Dr Olasupo Olusi, said the conference presented an opportunity to develop innovative ideas and initiatives towards improving access to finance, export credit, partial credit guarantees and other risk-sharing financing structures.
He noted that more importantly, the country’s current macro-economic realities place a lot of responsibility on development banks like BoI and multilateral and financial institutions like IFC to expand their risk appetite through out-of-the-box financing ideas.
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