Minister of Communications and Digital Economy, Prof. Isa Pantami, said the IT sector consistently contributed to the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) of Nigeria, with 18.44 per cent in the second quarter of 2022.
Pantami said the sector is fast moving towards the actualisation of the government’s digital economy agenda with the implementation of the National Digital Economy Policy and Strategy 2020-2030 (NDEPS).
The minister said that in different quarters of 2020, 2021 and 2022, the sector had contributed immensely to the GDP, thereby making it the sector with the highest contribution.
“The ICT sector provided three unprecedented contributions to the GDP of the country in the last three years.
“IT contributed 14.07 per cent in the first quarter of 2020, 17.92 per cent in the second quarter of 2021 and 18.44 per cent in the second quarter of 2022.
“At each time, these numbers were the highest ever contribution of the ICT sector to the GDP,’’ he said.
According to the minister, the ICT sector grew by 14.70 per cent in the fourth quarter of 2020.
He said it made it the fastest growing sector of the Nigerian economy in the last quarter of 2020 and the only sector to have grown by double digits.
Pantami added that in 2020, the sector played a critical role in enabling Nigeria to exit recession.
He said: “The quarterly revenues also generated for the Federal Government rose from N51.3 billion to N408.7 billion, through spectrum sales and taxes from the sector.’’
The minister further said that the ministry was recently assessed for its performance by the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO), UK and KPMG, among others.
The assessment, he said, was in partnership with the Office of the Secretary to the Government of the Federation in the Presidency.
According to him, the ministry had developed a policy for promoting indigenous content in the telecom sector to complement similar efforts that focus on the information technology sector.
He said that it was important to stem the tide of capital flight, amongst other things.
Pantami said the efforts of the ministry continued to play a critical role in the development of the different sectors of the economy.
He called on all stakeholders to persistently support the government to further accelerate the development of the sector.
