Idigbe canvasses improved GDP, access to credit

A senior Advocate of Nigeria, Chief Anthony Idigbe has called for wider access to credit and a regulated environment for credit reporting in order to grow Nigeria’s Gross Domestic Product.

He expressed the view at the recently concluded one-day Conference of Western Attorneys-General (CWAG) and African Alliance Partnership (AAP)conference in Lagos.

Also, the Founder of Credit Registry and a pioneer of credit reporting in Nigeria, Mr. Taiwo Ayedun said there is an urgent need for increased access to credit for the economy and GDP growth.

Ayedun said this at the Credit Reporting as the Foundation of Credit Infrastructure workshop organised by the Credit Bureau Association of
Nigeria (CBAN), Conference of Western Attorney General (CWAG) and AAP in collaboration with the Lagos Business School in Lagos.

Comparing Nigeria to other developed countries, he said it was important to have a good credit reporting and scoring behavior, which he said would aide consumer lending which mostly concedes GDP and economic growth.

Ayedun said: “The US GDP which is about $19 trillion, I found that mortgage and consumer spending concluded 67percent of the US GDP. And a lot of that consumer and mortgage spending is based on the credit been given by American banks. So it makes sense that if Nigeria is going to increase in GDP, it would need to be able to help banks to give more credit to Nigerians.

“Global Credit coverage around the world shows that North America, Canada, United States, Germany, UK and Ireland are 100percent covered,
while Nigeria has only about 7.8perecnt coverage according to this survey which was done in 2017. However, there is evidence that a society where trust is well established, there is more commerce going on.”

He further added that as more credit flows to consumers and small businesses, it would boost economic activities and the reason it has a direct correlation to GDP and economic growth is that the quantum of transactions leads to more productivity.