Barring any further hitches, the Nigerian economy will be out of recession in 2018, Statistician-General of the Federation, Dr. Yemi Kale, has said. In an interview with the Economic Confi dential in Abuja, Kale said, “if all prices did not collapse, including Niger Delta crisis, by 2018, we would have recovered.” Speaking on the economic situation currently bedevilling the nation, he said: “It was an extremely diffi cult period and we all felt it. I will say that most of the indicators suggest that we are coming out of it.
“We have not come out of it yet. As if the worst has already happened and it’s a slow process of recovery. Now there is what we call technical recovery as diff erent from the recovery Nigerians would prefer. “When you tell somebody, the economy is coming out of recession, they would say what do you mean, after all prices are still high? Coming out of recession means positive growth. And your positive growth can be plus zero point one (+0.1). Th at does not mean everything is fi ne. It technically means you are no longer in negative again.” Continuing, he said: “At least all the indicators are suggesting things are getting better.
People always make this mistake when we say infl ation is slowing down. Slowing down of Infl ation does not mean prices are coming down. “Infl ation by defi nition is always a rise in price. All we are saying is that increase is not as much as before. Before it went up by 100%, but this time it went up by 50%. Having double digit infl ation fi gure is still huge and a problem. Th e fact that it went down from 18% to 17% and now to 16% shows improvement. But I can tell you 16% is not good but a huge problem. “If the trend continues, by the end of the year things should have normalised and by 2018 Nigerians would now see the benefi t of the recovery. If all prices do not collapse, including Niger Delta crisis, by 2018, we would have recovered fully.”
According to him, 2016 was extremely diffi cult for the nation. “I have to speak frankly as I have always done in the past. Th e economy has been slowing down since 2014. Anybody that has been following the numbers should know that the economy was slowing down. From six it went to fi ve then to four, then to three and went to two before it became negative. “Th e fact that the economy was slowing down did not mean it went from six to zero No. It was gradual. If you have paying attention to data, you would have known that problem was looming. Since it was an election year, people did not pay that rapped attention. And so 2016 was horrible as we went through a lot of hell. We had an economy in my opinion that is dysfunctional.”
“Rather than diversify the economy, we have an economy solely dependent on oil. Th e other sectors depend on oil to survive. We have manufacturing, but their production input is dependent on foreign materials. And foreign inputs depend on foreign reserves, while our foreign reserves depend on oil. And when oil price goes down, and we do not have enough reserves, and manufacturers do not get foreign exchange to get their inputs, they cannot produce and so resort to black market to source for foreign exchange at high price and cost of production goes up. Th is cost will eventually be passed to consumers. In this scenario, demand goes down while cost goes up,” the NBS boss added.
