BEVERLY HILLS, March 07, (THEWILL) – The Federal Government, after months of extensive consultations with stakeholders from both the private and public sectors of the economy, on Tuesday, released the Economic Recovery and Growth Plan (ERGP) with a target of creating 15 million jobs.
The plan, which is expected to take the country out of recession and has been in the works since 2016, is a medium term plan aimed at revamping the economy between 2017 and 2020.
The document which was released by the Ministry of Budget and National Planning revealed that the core vision of the plan is one of sustained inclusive growth to drive structural economic transformation with an emphasis on improving both public and private sector efficiency.
The aim is to increase national productivity and achieve sustainable diversification of production, to significantly grow the economy and achieve maximum welfare for the citizens, beginning with food and energy security with the hope that by 2020, Nigeria would have made significant progress towards achieving structural economic change with a more diversified and inclusive economy.
Overall, the plan is expected to deliver on five key broad outcomes, which are a stable macroeconomic environment; agricultural transformation and food security; sufficiency in energy (power and petroleum products); improved transportation infrastructure and industrialization focusing on small and medium scale enterprises.
However, the federal government hopes to raise Nigeria’s oil production levels from 2.2 million barrels per day to 2.5 million barrels by 2020 from a low of 1.6 barrels daily in the third quarter of 2016.
The plan also proposes reforms including increasing value-added tax on luxury products to 15 percent in 2018 from 5 percent and improving compliance to add 350 billion naira to annual revenue collections while 100,000 hectares of additional arable land will be irrigated to boost production to meet domestic demand and export products including rice, cashew nuts, ground nuts, cassava and vegetable oil by 2020.
“The ERGP differs from previous plans in several ways. First, focused implementation is at the core of the delivery strategy of the plan over the next four years,” the document read.
“More than ever before, there is a strong political determination, commitment and will at the highest level. Whilst all the MDAs will have their different roles in implementing the plan, a delivery unit is being established in the presidency to drive the implementation of key ERGP priorities.
“The ministry of budget and national planning will coordinate plan-implementation and for this purpose will, amongst other things, build up its capability for robust monitoring and evaluation.”
