Abuja – A Consultant to the European Union (EU), Mr Christopher Okafor, has advised the Federal Government to invest more in data production to help accelerate national development.
Okafor, who is Head of EU Support to the Federal Governance Reform (SUFEGOR) Programme, made the call in an interview with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Abuja on Wednesday.
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According to him, the quality of available data is a function of the investment made.
“The low investment in data had in the past compromised quality of data and led to users’ despondency.
“In the past, it had deleterious effect on data production within the country and so we can up our game by investing more in statistical production.
“A good example is when I was in service; we urged collaboration between the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) and Central Bank and that led to production of first quarterly Gross Domestic Product (GDP) series which were recently re-based.
“They spent N54.1 million in carrying out that exercise but Nigeria realised that it was underestimating its GDP by as much as N110 billion.’’
Okafor said that investment in the GDP series was rewarding, stressing that money spent on data production is always money well spent.
He explained that the rating of Nigeria as the 26th largest economy in the world actually stemmed from the bases of the GDP worth $550 billion.
“So, there is power in data; that also was one of the bases for Nigeria getting the debt relief at that time because we did the exercise in 2005 and the debt relief thing was in 2006.
“The Per Capita Income which was computed from that was the basis of according Nigeria an International Development Association (IDA) only status.
“This status which is accorded to the countries which were seen to carry out reforms and whose capital income was within 3, 000 US dollars.
“So, Nigeria qualified and we got 18 billion dollars written off as our debt.’’
He, however, said that the nation’s debt relief by the Paris Club was based on the data the country had generated and made available in addition to the Nigeria’s economic diplomacy. (NAN)