Nigeria’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) grew by 2.38 per cent in real terms (year-on-year), the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) reported Tuesday.
The latest growth rate represents an increase of 0.27 per cent points when compared to the fourth quarter of 2017 which recorded a growth rate of 2.11 per cent.
It also indicates a rise of 0.55 per cent points when compared with the growth rate recorded in Q3 2018.
Further analysis showed that on a quarter on quarter basis, real GDP growth was 5.31 per cent.
The fourth quarter growth performance implies that real GDP grew at an annual growth rate of 1.93 per cent in 2018, compared to 0.82 per cent recorded in 2017, an increase of 1.09 per cent points.
During the quarter, aggregate nominal GDP stood at N35.23 trillion, which is higher than N31.28 billion recorded in Q4 2017, a nominal growth rate of 12.65 per cent.
For 2018, nominal GDP was therefore recorded at N127.76 trillion representing a nominal growth rate of 12.36 per cent when compared to N113.71 trillion recorded in 2017.
Analysing the report, the Global Chief Economist of Renaissance Africa, Charlie Robertson, said Nigeria’s GDP has been slowly picking up since the oil price crash of 2014 to 2016 up 1.9 per cent in 2018 from the 0.8 per cent recorded the year before.
Robertson described the GDP growth rate of last quarter of 2018 as the “best in years at 2.4 per cent- but not fast enough to deal with Unemployment.”
A Value Investor, Lalode Akinmurele, said the latest GDP growth rate remains abysmal still for a country with a birth rate in excess of 2.6 per cent.
“The release is apt, four days to the February 16 polls,” he stated.
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