The Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, Dr. Zainab Ahmed, said on Monday that the country will exit its current recession in the fourth quarter of 2020 or first quarter of 2021.
The ministry gave this assurance at the opening of the two-day 26th Nigerian Economic Summit organised by the Nigerian Economic Summit Group and the Federal Ministry of Finance, Budget, and National Planning.
Ahmed said, “The current recession will be short-lived. The COVID-19-induced recession followed the pattern across the world where many countries have entered an economic recession.
“Let me remind us that before the impact of COVID-19, the Nigerian economy was experiencing sustained growth, which had been improving quarter by quarter until the second quarter of 2020 when the impact of the COVID-19 was felt
“While the economy has entered into recession in the third quarter, the trend of the growth suggests that this will be a short-lived recession, and indeed by the fourth or, at worst, the first quarter of 2021, the country will exit recession.
“Our expectation of a quick exit, which will be historically fast, is anchored on the several complementary fiscal, real sector and monetary interventions that have been proactively introduced by the government to forestall a far worse decline of the economy and alleviate the negative consequences of the pandemic.”
Nigeria’s Gross Domestic Product had recorded a contraction of 3.62 per cent in the third quarter of 2020.
The country had earlier recorded a 6.10 per cent contraction in the second quarter.
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