1st October, 2023
By Simon Akoje
Some financial experts have urged the Federal Government to adopt stable macroeconomic policies that would stimulate the growth of domestic production.
They also said that addressing the food insecurity challenges was pivotal in curbing the inflationary increases in the economy.
They said this in separate interviews with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Lagos on Sunday.
The Chief Executive Officer, Ogu Investment, Mr. Moses Igbrude, said the Federal Government could check inflation by ensuring the country becomes a hub for different productions.
“The government should immediately implement friendly fiscal and monitoring policies that will accelerate the growth of domestic producers.
“Then the country could manufacture, locally, many imported commodities and enhance domestic capacity in the process,” Igbrude said.
According to him, to tackle the inflation rate, the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) should endeavour to allocate more foreign exchange to deal with illiquidity issues.
“The inability of genuine businesses to access foreign exchange from the official windows, despite its current unification, is impeding their growth.
“This distortion is quite detrimental to the economy and partially responsible for the increasing cost of production,” Igbrude said.
In his view, a lecturer of economics at Pan Atlantic University, Dr. Austine Nwaeze, said the government should tackle the food insecurity responsible for the rising inflation rate.
“The tiers of government needed to collaborate more and gather actionable intelligence in order to mitigate the insecurity challenges in many farming communities.
“Then more young people should be encouraged to engage in mechanised farming without reservations, Nwaeze said.
He noted that the federal government should address economic fundamentals to curb rising inflation.
“The government needed to invest more in key infrastructure, such as uninterrupted electricity, while a functioning rail system connected to the sea ports is imperative for cheaper transportation costs,” Nwaeze said.
Also, the President of the Standard Shareholders Association of Nigeria (SSAN), Mr. Godwin Anono, said the federal government could check the rising inflation by ensuring that the plan to subsidise transportation costs was well implemented.
“The federal government could collaborate with other sub-nationals to manage its introduced transportation schemes, which will cost their people half the price.
“Especially from the urban areas to the hinterland, where the majority of the people reside,” Anono said.
He noted that the federal government should have more housing programmes to reduce the economic difficulties caused by the spike in the inflation rate.
Nigeria’s annual inflation rate rose to 25.80 percent in August from 24.08 percent in the previous month.
The statistics office said the August headline inflation rate shows an increase of 1.72 percent points when compared to the July headline inflation rate.
On a year-on-year basis, the headline inflation rate was 5.27 percent higher compared to the rate recorded in August 2022, which was 20.52 percent.
According to the report, the food inflation rate in August quickened to 29.34 percent on a year-on-year basis, which was 6.22 percent higher compared to the rate recorded in August (23.12 percent).
NAN