By Ugo Tochukwu

The Nigerian government recently announced the launch of the UK-Nigeria SPRIRET initiative (Supporting Policy Reforms for Innovation and Regulatory Enablers in Technology), a digital economy capacity-building program.

The SPRIRET initiative, which was officially announced during a two-day visit to Nigeria by the UK Minister for Africa and International Development,Jenny Chapman, and was hosted by Nigeria’s Minister of Finance and Coordinating Minister of the Economy, Taiwo Oyedele, is part of a wider £15 million UK-Nigeria growth partnership framework designed to support regulatory reforms and ease of doing business across the country.

Despite its enormous potential, Nigeria’s digital economy has remained one of the least explored sectors due to challenges such as inadequate infrastructure and inefficient, ineffective policies. Data indicates that the sector currently contributes between 19% and 20% of the national GDP, with government and private projections pointing to massive future growth driven by structural reforms, fintech expansion, and increased internet penetration.

According to projections, if fully harnessed, Nigeria’s digital economy is estimated to contribute over $ 120 billion to the country’s GDP within the next decade. It is also predicted that with sustained investment support in connectivity and AI ecosystems, the sector could hit $30billion in revenue before 2030. But for the country to stand any chance of achieving this, it must be deliberate about making immediate purpose-driven investments in the sector.

The launch of the SPRIRET initiative as one of the first standout programmes under Mr Taiwo Oyedele as Finance and Economy Minister was a clear statement on his development plan for the country’s economy. There are two strategic and impressive aspects of the initiative that should make every Nigerian optimistic about the future.

Firstly, the initiative will mostly leverage already existing policies like the National Digital Economy Policy and Strategy 2020-2030 document, which was designed to reorient the Nigerian economy to capitalize on the numerous opportunities that digital technology offers.

 

This and several other previous policies drove Nigeria’s digital transformation growth at an explosive pace, evolving from a small telecom market to Africa’s largest digital economy. Various statistics show that the Information and Communications Technology (ICT) sector has expanded significantly, with industry reports valuing the Nigeria Digital Transformation Market at $13.96 billion.

Within the last decade, the Nigerian government has either solely initiated or collaborated with the private sector to initiate programmes aimed at promoting digital upscaling of local talents.

Some of them include, partnership with Microsoft to train five million youth across the country in technical skills in 2021; Google Africa Developer Scholarship program, which provides training in mobile and web development; partnership between Cisco and the Nigeria’s National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) to bridge Nigeria’s digital divide and launched a new EDGE (Experience Design Go-to-market Earn) Center in Lagos that provides incubation programs for SMEs, among others.

 

These efforts over the years have resulted in tangible outcomes contributing to the current booming ecosystem.

Another key aspect of the SPRIRET initiative is the deliverables. It is understood that part of what the programme hopes to achieve is enhancing governance reforms and helping to reduce regulatory barriers constraining investment in broadband infrastructure, digital services, and emerging technologies.

 

“The UK-Nigeria Growth Programme helps bring this partnership to life by supporting capital market development, technology investment, small businesses and technical assistance,” Mr Oyedele had said shortly after the meeting with Ms Chapman.

According to available data, Nigeria’s digital economy currently grapples with a multi-billion-dollar infrastructure deficit, underlined by an annual $14 billion infrastructure funding shortfall across all sectors, translating to several major technological and systemic gaps that hinder widespread digital transformation.

 

The country’s broadband penetration rate reportedly hovers around 55.67%, leaving roughly 33 million citizens completely offline. “The country has only about 265,000 active Fibre-to-the-Home (FTTH) connections and requires a multi-billion-dollar investment to expand its backbone network”, reports the Punch Newspapers.

The news medium also notes that the country suffers from a significant internet hosting deficit, with only 22% of top local websites hosted within the country, adding that over-reliance on foreign platforms and offshore data hosting costs the nation roughly $850 million annually. Also, the country faces a relatively low adoption of emerging tools like generative AI (compared to the global average) caused by inadequate access to reliable electricity, robust internet connectivity, and foundational digital skills.

By my understanding of Mr Oyedele’s remarks on the launch of the SPRIRET initiative, this infrastructure deficit and other shortfalls are part of the problems that the initiative is structured to solve.

Under his watch, it is expected that the initiative will lead reforms that will solve critical bottlenecks in the country’s tech and digital sectors by eliminating overlapping restrictions, standardize policies to create an enabling environment that will allow emerging technologies to grow and thrive, provide necessary technical assistance to help technology and digital entrepreneurs overcome scaling and operational hurdles, among others.

 

In the course of the next three years, which is the timeframe for the initiative, Mr Oyedele’s experience and expertise in policy planning and implementation will be pivotal in ensuring the SPRIRET programme makes massive consolidation on the successes in the sector to further drive the country towards achieving its goals for the digital economy.

Lastly, the initiative will run in five pivot states, which are yet to be disclosed. In choosing the states, the Oyedele-led team and partners will be expected to consider several factors like availability of infrastructure, ease of penetration, availability of local talents, etc.

 

This stage of decision-making will be critical to the success of the programme, and Mr Oyedele, with the right decisions, policies, and strategies, is on the verge of leading Nigeria into a new era of economic advancement driven by digital transformation.