Bill and Melinda Gates
While one billion people have lifted themselves out of poverty over the past 20 years, rapid population growth in Nigeria and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, are likely to make them the highest concentration of the poorest by 2050. More than 40 per cent of “extremely poor people” in the world will be living in Nigeria and DR Congo by 2050, a report by Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has revealed.
This is coming as the world’s second richest man and the Co-founder, Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF), Bill Gates, has called on the Nigerian government to increase efforts to fund human capital development as this will propel the country towards achieving the year 2030 Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) set by the United Nations.
In the 2018 goalkeepers report released yesterday, the Bill and Melinda Foundation said by 2050, Nigeria will have 152 million people in extreme poverty out of a projected population of 429 million.
It blamed this on the lack of investment in human capital to correspond with the increasing population growth.
Nigeria is currently the seventh most populous country in the world with an estimated population of 198 million.
The annual report, produced in partnership with the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME) at the University of Washington, tracks progress being made on the United Nations sustainable development goals (SDGs).
In June, Brookings Institution reported that Nigeria had overtaken India as the country with the highest number of poor people, with 87 million of its citizens in extreme poverty.
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) had also said in March that Nigerians are getting poorer due to the lack of coherent and comprehensive economic reforms.
The goalkeepers report said while more than a billion in the world have lifted themselves out of extreme poverty since 2000, “extreme poverty is becoming heavily concentrated in sub-Saharan African countries.”
“By 2050, that’s where 86 per cent of the extremely poor people in the world are projected to live. The challenge is that within Africa, poverty is concentrating in just a handful of very fast-growing countries,” the report said.
“By 2050, for example, more than 40 per cent of the extremely poor people in the world will live in just two countries: Democratic Republic of Congo and Nigeria. Even within these countries, poverty is still concentrating in certain areas.”
The foundation said to address the poverty crisis, adequate investment would need to be made in young people, especially in areas of education, health and human capital development.
“Investing in young people’s health and education is the best way for a country to unlock productivity and innovation; cut poverty, create opportunities and generate prosperity,” the report added.
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