The federal government has so far spent N502.3 billion as COVID-19 intervention fund, Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning Hajiya Zainab Ahmed has said.
The minister announced this Tuesday at the proposed national dialogue on COVID-19 economic impact and assessment of national and states’ recovery plan and policy options in Abuja.
She said Nigeria was hard hit by the global health crisis which caused a fall in crude oil prices.
The minister said: “You know that in the 2020 budget, N500 billion was appropriated and it was fully funded, but apart from that we also have the economic sustainability plan that is totalling N2.3 billion which is in the form of intervention funds from the CBN, which means loans are given to the private sector and they pay back later.”
Hajiya Ahmed said the pandemic had made it imperative for the government to fix its health sector.
She said the health crisis resulted in the President Muhammadu Buhari-led administration taking proactive and people-oriented policies with emphasis on human capital development and critical infrastructure.
“The pandemic has required that we take a critical look at our health and economic policies, to swiftly introduce crisis management measures, catalyze support to the health sector, and accelerate certain key reforms while reimagining others entirely.
“Several fiscal measures were put in place to balance health and economic issues in addressing the burden of COVID-19 on Macro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs), as part of the integrated policy framework which ensures coherence in fiscal, economy and health positions,” Hajiya Ahmed said.
The minister listed the key interventions to include; the establishment of a N500 billion COVID-19 crisis intervention fund to finance the upgrade and improvement of healthcare facilities; creation of a Special Public Works Programme to employ 774,000 people, among several others.
Besides, Ahmed said, the government would continue to make critical investments in key sectors including agriculture, infrastructure, health, and education to provide jobs for millions of unemployed youths as well as support SMEs.
“Additionally, we are focusing on enabling digital transformation and disruptive innovation, a key driver for MSME innovation and scale up across the country,” she added.
She assured that the ministry would partner with “SEDIN in its support to national and sub-national Governments in Nigeria. In particular, the continued empowerment of micro, small and medium sized enterprises (MSMEs) is a critical driver for building back better in Nigeria and across the African continent. We look forward to receiving the final report of today’s Dialogue and the results.”
In her address, representative of GIZ SEDIN head of programme, Ana Vinambres, said the SEDIN programme had helped to attract funds for small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and small holder farmers through bank loans and access to inputs.
“The SEDIN programme has also widely contributed to the immediate, medium and long term response to COVID19, including the facilitation of funds for MSMEs and farmers to cover their immediate liquidity issues from government’s targeted facilities, commercial banks and impact investors, the access to raw Inputs and compost production at a time when trade was impacted, facilitating linkages to open markets and identifying collection centers closed to producers to avoid profiteering.
“In the medium term, SEDIN NICOP supported the setting-up of the online Om tor coordinated Covid-19 Impact investment responses,” she said.
Vinambres said while “COVID-19 is still here with us, it is important to look at additional ways to support MSMES resilience, create new jobs and fast track economic recovery.”
She said the organisation was committed to taking forward the recommendations of the dialogue as “we are open as well to further support and collaboration with all relevant stakeholders.”
25 countries meet on restrictions
Meanwhile, 25 countries have taken steps to address the unavailability and restriction of vaccines to some countries, especially in developing countries to end the COVID-19 pandemic.
These countries include Argentina, Brazil, Chile, China, Colombia, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Egypt, Hungary, Indonesia, Kenya, Malaysia, Mexico, Morocco, Pakistan, the Philippines, Serbia, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Turkey, the United Arab Emirates and Uzbekistan, convened the first International Forum on COVID-19 Vaccine Cooperation to ensure fair and equitable distribution of vaccines, and increase the vaccine production capacity of developing countries.
Chinese state Councillor and Foreign Minister, Wang Yi, who chaired the meeting with the theme: “Strengthening International Cooperation on Vaccines, Promoting Fair and Equitable Distribution of Vaccines around the World,” stated that every country must have access to the vaccine.
“In the battle, vaccines are of vital importance. They should be distributed around the world fairly and equitably with no country and no one left behind. They should truly serve as people’s vaccines. This is essential for defeating the virus. It is also a matter of international justice,” he said.
Yi revealed that China had been providing vaccines to countries in need since September 2020 and since donated vaccines to over 100 countries and exporting vaccines to over 60 countries, with a total of over 770 million doses, ranking first in the world.
He stated that four Chinese vaccines had been approved for use in over 100 countries and international authorities recognised their safety and effectiveness.
“China acted quickly to work with other developing countries on vaccine production. The UAE, Egypt, Indonesia and Brazil have become the first country in their respective region to have COVID vaccine production capacity. Together, we have created another success story of developing countries seeking strength through solidarity. China has also provided vaccines to COVAX, UN peacekeepers and the International Olympic Committee,” he said
He, therefore, called on world leaders to tap into the opportunity to ensure COVID-19 vaccines become available to all.
“Recently, China launched an Initiative for Belt and Road Partnership on COVID-19 Vaccines Cooperation. We welcome the participation of more countries.”
A joint statement of the International Forum on COVID-19 Vaccine Cooperation issued at the end of the meeting, recognised solidarity and cooperation as crucial to fighting against the COVID-19 pandemic.
“We must champion the vision of building a global community of health for all, put people and their lives first and make concerted and coordinated efforts to address the challenge.
“We call upon all countries, in cooperation with the relevant stakeholders, to increase national, regional and global capacities, carry out vaccine research and development as well as production in line with strict standards according to the World Health Organization (WHO) regulations, and provide safe, effective and high-quality COVID-19 vaccines.”
Phase 2 vaccination commences
In a related development, the second phase of COVID-19 vaccination will commence August 16, Executive Director National Primary Health Care Development Agency (NPHCDA) Dr Faisal Shuaib has said.
Speaking Tuesday at a media parley in Abuja, Dr Shuaib stated that the second phase vaccination would take off at 8am at FCMB, Jabi, Abuja.
He said Nigeria received 4, 00,080 doses of Moderna COVID-19 vaccine donated by the government of the United States and another 176,000 doses of the vaccine of Johnson & Johnson vaccines were expected Wednesday.
The NPHCDA boss said the 176, 000 doses were coming out of the 29,850,000 doses the federal government procured from the AFREXIM Bank through the African Union.
“In the 1st phase of vaccination rollout, the collaboration between NAFDAC and NPHCDA led to the first ever tracking and tracing of vaccines globally.
“This tracking and tracing of vaccines from the national to sub national level and to the point of administration was conducted for the first time in Nigeria.
“This is why when we had said we had finished the 1st phase of the vaccination on the 9thof July, it was that there were no vaccines available anywhere and this kind of accountability is what we want to replicate in the phase 2 of the vaccination,” Shuaib said.
He stated that NAFDAC took the samples of the vaccine to test for integrity and consistency in line with global standard “to ensure it is in line with the product information that has been provided by the US government and Moderna.”
He said NAFDAC had approved the Moderna vaccine for use.
“Consequently, we want to call on all Nigerians to remain assured that the vaccine that we have are safe and will be deployed next week as earlier communicated. The flag-off and roll out of the 2nd phase of the COVID-19 vaccination programme will be done on August 16th, 2021,’’ the agency said.
He further said the agency was wrapping up the training of about 40, 739 health workers across the national, state and ward levels “on the take-off of the phase 2 strategic vaccine roll out plan with focus on improving the delivery, communication, data management of the vaccine and logistics that are needed.”
