High interest rates have been identified by 75 per cent of businesses, as their primary operational constraint in January 2025. This is contained in the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN)’s Business Expectation Survey (BES) for January 2025. BES is a monthly survey of leading firms drawn from Business Establishment updated frames of the CBN and National Bureau of Statistics (NBS).
  
The January 2025 BES was conducted from January 13 to 17, 2025 with a sample size of 1,900 business enterprises across Nigeria. The survey achieved a response rate of 99.7 per cent, covering three key sectors: industry, services and agriculture.
  
The report, which assessed the economic landscape for businesses across various sectors, highlighted key obstacles hampering growth and productivity in Nigeria. 
  
The survey identified six major factors that negatively impacted businesses in January 2025, including high interest rates with 75 per cent of businesses reporting this as their primary constraint, just as 74.3 per cent of businesses cited security concerns as another major challenge. 73.9 per cent noted power shortages as a key issue, 73 per cent listed excessive taxation as a hindrance to growth, 69.3 per cent of businesses faced liquidity and funding difficulties, while 68.2 per cent highlighted excessive bank fees as a burden on operations.
  
The findings reflect the persistent economic challenges affecting businesses across Nigeria, with financial burdens, infrastructural issues and security concerns ranking as major obstacles.
  
Breaking it down into sectors, the mining and quarrying industry led with an overall capacity utilisation of 56.8 per cent, reaching 60.3 per cent at a point. This indicates that businesses in this sector were able to leverage available resources and opportunities better than others amid economic uncertainties. Respondents were optimistic that the volume of business activity in February, April and July 2025 would be favourable.
  
While the CBN has implemented multiple interest rate hikes to curb inflation, the Monetary Policy Rate (MPR) has been raised by a total of 875 basis points in 2024, moving from 18.75 per cent at the start of the year to 27.50 per cent in November. But rather than curbing inflation, the persistent high-interest rate environment has made borrowing expensive, limiting expansion and investment opportunities for businesses. 
  
Insecurity continues to pose a significant threat, particularly in northern Nigeria and rural areas where kidnapping, banditry and insurgency disrupt commercial activities.  
  
Additionally, erratic power supply has driven up operating costs for businesses relying on alternative energy sources. Multiple taxation and financial burdens further compound the difficulties businesses face in achieving sustainable growth.