GASPRO International Journal of Eminent Scholars

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DEVELOPMENT SPENDING AND POVERTY ERADICATION: LESSONS FROM NIGERIA

ABSTRACT

The eradication of poverty occupies the first spot on the sustainable development goals agenda and the enhanced delivery of development finance is seen as a possible stimulant to its realization. This study therefore investigates development spending and the extent of its effects on poverty alleviation; with particular focus on the Nigerian scenario. It specifically assesses the effects of federal government capital expenditures on agriculture, education, health and infrastructure (works, roads and housing) on per capita income in Nigeria. Annual time series data from 1990 to 2021, obtained from the World Bank as well as the Central Bank of Nigeria Databases were utilized for the study, which were analysed using the Auto Regressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) estimation technique. The results reveal that capital expenditure on agriculture, health and infrastructure have insignificant, mainly positive,effects on per capita income while that on education has a significant negative effect on per capita income. Thus, development spending has not impacted strongly on poverty eradication in Nigeria. It is therefore recommended that the federal government should be more consistent in its capital spending on primary welfare while particularly reviewing its educational spending, especially with regards to the NEEDS assessment of educational institutions.

Keywords: Development Spending, Poverty Eradication, Agriculture, Education, Health, Infrastructure

ABAKASANGA, Ekpo Ekefre

GASPRO INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF EMINENT SCHOLARS, VOL. 12 NO. 3