Telecoms Investment In Nigeria Hits $75.6bn – Danbatta

The Executive Vice Chairman (EVC) of the Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC), Prof. Umar Garba Danbatta, has officially announced that the investment profile in the nation’s telecommunications sector, comprising foreign direct investment (FDI) and local investment, has reached $75.6 billion as of 2021.

Danbatta disclosed this at an interactive session with stakeholders in the communications media ecosystem, in Lagos on Wednesday where he provided his scorecards and landmark developments that have shaped the trajectory of growth in the telecoms sector since he became the chief telecom regulator in August 2015.

According to Danbatta, in 2018, investment profile in the sector stood at $68 billion. This increased to $70.5 billion in 2019 and $72 billion in 2020. At the end of 2021, the figure rose to $75,560,563,417.79 ($75.6 billion). The latest figure is the current official investment profile computed in the industry up from the initial $70 billion investment in the last few years.

Investment in the telecommunications sector in Nigeria is computed from two sources: the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), and the financial data obtained from service providers by the Commission.

While the CBN collects and calculates an element of the telecoms sector to include FDI, portfolio and others, the Commission collects investment figures from telecom licensees described as domestic investment arising from capital expenditure (CAPEX) which form part of the total investment in the industry.

The NCC CEO said through effective regulatory environment put in place by the Commission, the telecom sector has recorded tremendous growth from an initial investment profile of $500 million as at 2001, when the sector was fully liberalised.

Similarly, Danbatta said the telecom sector has continued to be a major contributor to the Nigeria’s economy through an impressive the sectoral contribution to the nation’s Gross Domestic Product (GDP) quarterly, up from about 8.5 per cent in third quarter of 2015, contributing N10.126 trillion to the nation’s GDP in 2022 alone.

Citing data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), Danbatta said the telecoms sector contributed N10.126 trillion as an aggregate quarterly contribution to GDP in 2022.