Development plan vital to SDG attainment, says minister

The Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, Hajiya Zainab Ahmed, has said that the National Development Plan (2021-2025) has been designed to secure the future of Nigeria, including satisfying the requirements for the attainment of the Sustainable Development Goals 2030.

According to her, the NDP would ease constraints that had hindered the economy from attaining its full potentials, particularly in the product mapping space, and expunge obstacles to business.

The minister said these during a forum to measure the performance of NDP (2021-2025).

Speeches delivered at the programme were obtained by journalists in Abuja on Sunday.

The event was attended by the Special Adviser to the President on Finance and the Economy, Dr. Sarah Alade; the Minister of State for Finance, Budget and National Planning, Prince Clem Agba; and Permanent Secretary, Nebeolisa Anako.

Other dignitaries were the Special Adviser to the President on Ease of Doing Business, Dr. Jumoke Oduwole; Acting Director, Macro-Economic Analysis Department, Felix Okonkwo and an economist, Dayo Alao.

Okonkwo said the NDP would be driven by the private sector with N300tn investment.

He said, “Let me just mention that this plan is different from other plans we have in the past, very different. It is going to be driven by the private sector.

“The funding, the investment size envelope of this plan is about N350tn, out of which the private sector is providing N300tn, while the government is providing N50tn approximately.

“The actual figure is N348tn but I just decided to round up the number. So 68 per cent of investment size of the plan is from the private sector, while only 14 per cent is from the public.”

Ahmed gave an insight on why the government decided to drive the NDP (2021-2025).

She said, “I want to place on record that this plan is sufficiently comprehensive with the capacity to attain various regional and global agendas including the AU Agenda 2063, the ECOWAS Integration Agenda 2050 and the Sustainable Development Goals 2030.

“In order to have the future we all desire, the plan is developed to play a sizeable role in the product complexity space internationally and also adopt measures to easing constraints that have hindered the economy from attaining its full potentials, particularly in the product mapping space.”

According to Agba, the plan was carefully done to ensure that it was not seen as an agenda of the President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.); Federal Government of Nigeria and All Progressives Congress.