NESG: Nigeria faces jobs emergency, but key sectors can unlock 27m new roles

Nigeria has just five years to avert a looming employment crisis by creating at least 27 million new formal jobs, according to the Nigerian Economic Summit Group (NESG).

In its Jobs and Productivity Report, released on the sidelines of the group’s 31st economic summit in Abuja, NESG warned that without urgent reforms, the country’s unemployment and underemployment rate could soar to 30 per cent by 2030 as the working-age population swells to 168 million.

The group described the next half-decade as a “make-or-break window” for labour market stability. “Jobs and productivity are central to Nigeria’s economic development,” the report stressed, adding that only large-scale, formal job creation can absorb millions of new entrants and move workers away from low-productivity informal activities.

NESG identified manufacturing, agriculture, digital technology, construction, and professional services as priority industries with the capacity to generate mass employment. It projected that manufacturing alone could deliver 21 per cent of the required new jobs, while collectively, the five priority sectors could provide 9.7 million roles – a third of the total needed.

“The opportunity is clear: Nigeria must transform jobless GDP growth into inclusive, employment-rich growth,” the group said, warning that existing challenges – from skills gaps and poor education to weak infrastructure, pervasive informality, and regulatory bottlenecks – are preventing firms from expanding.

To change course, NESG called for a Jobs and Productivity Agenda, anchored on six pillars:

Skills for productivity

Sectoral engines of job growth

Enterprise-led growth

Robust data systems

Strong institutions and accountability

Productivity for prosperity

It also unveiled a Nigeria Works Framework, which sets out interventions to boost competitiveness, strengthen the private sector, and align government reforms with job creation targets.

“More urgent than ever, Nigeria needs a coordinated and sustained effort to drive enterprise growth, raise productivity, and expand formal employment opportunities,” the report concluded.