Leadership (Abuja)
8 January 2009
The Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, Professor Chukwuma Soludo has disclosed that while Nigeria's poverty incidence is 54 percent with some areas as high as 95 percent, women make about 70 percent of the poor in Nigeria, as reported by the UNDP.
Giving an insight into some of the reasons for the high incidence of women poverty in Nigeria, Professor Soludo observed that, "even though primary/secondary school enrolment has almost 50/50 male/female proportion (and even slightly higher for females in some Eastern states), the male/female literacy rate is still at about 60/40".
In a recent lecture titled, "Creating an Inclusive Economy for the Nigerian woman" at the 2008 International Federation of Women Lawyers (FIDA) Week, Owerri, Imo State, the CBN boss further noted that women provide 70 per cent of Nigeria's agricultural labour force and are self-employed, with less than 5 per cent having bank accounts.
"Women have little or no rights to land in Nigeria; women work longer in the poorest paying jobs and women have much less access to formal financial services than men", he added.
This trend, he insisted, must be reversed to create an all-inclusive economy for, "the Nigerian economy to be one of the Next 11 countries (N11s), after Brazil, Russia, India and China (BRICs) which have the potential for tremendous economic growth in the next two decades; Nigeria to achieve its potentials and meet the Millennium Goals and also achieve President Umaru Musa Yar'Adua's 7-point agenda and for the country to be one of the top 20 economies in the year 2020".
According to the erudite professor, access to finance is critical to the achievement of an all-inclusive economy.
Based on this realisation, he said the CBN has taken various policy steps to help create a financial system that will bring robust and reliable financial services to all Nigerians; help reduce poverty and engender growth and development as well as boost the real sector and generate employment.
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