On May 4th, 2023, President Muhammadu Buhari launched Nigeria Agenda 2050 (NA 2050), a new long-term national development plan aimed at transforming Nigeria into a dynamic, industrialized, and knowledge-based economy. The plan’s vision is to achieve a per capita Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of $33,328 per annum and to place Nigeria among the top middle-income economies in the world by 2050. The President inaugurated the NA 2050 before the Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting in Abuja, Nigeria.
President Buhari stated that the plan’s implementation measures were already in place, and successive administrations would find the document useful in delivering electoral promises. The NA 2050 was developed as a successor plan to both Nigeria Vision 20:2020 and the Economic Recovery and Growth Plan (ERGP) 2017-2020, which lapsed in December 2020.
The National Steering Committee, led by the Minister of Finance, Budget, and National Planning, Zainab Ahmed, developed the NA 2050. The plan was formulated after a participatory and consultative process that involved all critical stakeholders, including federal ministries, departments, and agencies, states, local government areas, the organized private sector, youth organizations, labor unions, traditional and religious institutions, major political parties, women organizations, and people with special needs.
According to Ahmed, the NA 2050 is designed to address Nigeria’s subsisting economic and social challenges, including low, fragile and non-inclusive growth, insecurity, high population growth rate, limited concentric economic diversification, and low productivity. With improved capital accumulation, the private sector is expected to finance most of the plan’s bulk investment. Total employment is projected to increase to 203.41 million in 2050 from 46.49 million in 2020, while unemployment is expected to drop significantly to 6.3 per cent in 2050 from 33.3 per cent in 2020. The number of people in poverty is expected to drop to 2.1 per cent by 2050 from 83 million in 2020.
President Buhari commended the National Steering Committee for delivering on this important national assignment and described the unveiling and public presentation of NA 2050 as another milestone in Nigeria’s planning experience. He added that this feat showed his administration’s commitment to planning and plan implementation since assuming office on May 29th, 2015.
