Nigeria risks becoming largely a consumer rather than a producer of technology unless the country urgently invests in local talent, digital infrastructure, indigenous technology platforms and data driven innovation, stakeholders at a Nigerian Economic Summit Group, NESG, pre summit dialogue have warned. The warning was made at the virtual dialogue organised by the NESG in collaboration with the Federal Ministry of Budget and Economic Planning ahead of the 32nd Nigerian Economic Summit. The session, themed “Digital Nigeria: The Foundation for Transformation,” brought together policymakers, regulators, technology entrepreneurs and private sector leaders to examine how digital transformation could drive productivity, competitiveness and economic growth.
Speaking at the event, Director General of the National Information Technology Development Agency, NITDA, Kashifu Inuwa Abdullahi, said Nigeria’s digital transformation must move beyond simply adopting foreign technologies to developing the capacity to create solutions that address the country’s economic and strategic needs. He said digital self determination should enable Nigeria to make meaningful choices about its digital future, while stressing that the country’s youthful population, entrepreneurial culture and expanding technology ecosystem provided the foundation for becoming a major digital producer.
Abdullahi, however, noted that Nigeria’s potential would remain largely untapped without substantial investment in digital skills, infrastructure, technology companies, indigenous platforms, research and algorithms. He also called for policies that would enable the country to derive greater economic value from its data instead of allowing Nigerian data resources to generate most of their value outside the country. Technology entrepreneurs at the dialogue similarly warned that regulatory complexity and fragmented oversight were creating additional barriers for businesses seeking to scale within Nigeria’s digital economy.
Co founder of TradePal AI, Femi Adegolu, called for a harmonised regulatory framework involving the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Central Bank of Nigeria, particularly for technology and fintech companies operating across different regulatory jurisdictions. He also advocated tiered capital requirements that would allow smaller startups to enter regulated markets and incentives for data residency to encourage Nigerian businesses to retain more data locally. The stakeholders maintained that Nigeria must strengthen its local technology capacity if digital transformation is to create domestic wealth, jobs and productivity rather than deepen the country’s dependence on imported technology.