Nigeria: Legislators approve 2015 ‘s Appropriation Bill

Nigeria: Legislators approve 2015 ‘s Appropriation Bill

A week after the House of Representatives passed the 2015 Budget, the Upper Chamber fulfilled its part of the Appropriation process by passing a N4.5tn budget. This is N134.4bn in excess of the N4.4tn submitted by the Executive arm late 2014. Meanwhile, recurrent expenditure was reduced slightly by N0.5bn to N2.6tn while capital expenditure was scaled down by additional N85.9bn to N557.0bn from N642.8bn proposed by the Executive arm. Effectively, this implies that recurrent expenditure…

Read More

Chad to receive $1.1 billion debt relief – finance minister

Chad to receive $1.1 billion debt relief – finance minister

DAKAR, April 28 (Reuters) – Chad will receive $1.1 billion in debt relief after completion of the Highly Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) initiative of the World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF), its finance minister said on Tuesday. Kordje Bedoumra said in an interview that the oil-producing central African nation – one of the poorest countries on earth – had cut its growth forecast for this year to 5 percent, from 7 percent in 2014,…

Read More

Nigeria’s oil revenue drops by NGN 265bn

Nigeria’s oil revenue drops by NGN 265bn

The slump in the global price of crude oil has resulted in a drop of NGN 265.28bn in the revenue generated by Nigeria in the fourth quarter of 2014 when compared to what the country garnered in the preceding quarter of 2014 according to Punch Newspaper, Nigeria. Oil prices fell from over USD 100 per barrel in early 2014 to as low as USD 40 per barrel by December 2014. Over 70% of the Nigerian…

Read More

Africa to add more to workforce in 2035 than world combined

Africa to add more to workforce in 2035 than world combined

Growth in SSA should remain robust but decelerate in the wake of the decline in oil and commodity prices. This is according to the IMF’s latest Regional Economic Outlook for sub-Saharan Africa which projects that the region’s economy is set to register another year of solid performance, by expanding at 4.5% in 2015. While this rate will be at the lower end of the range experienced over the last few years, SSA will remain among…

Read More

Continued Weakness in Commodity Markets May Signal Long Term Easing of Prices

Continued Weakness in Commodity Markets May Signal Long Term Easing of Prices

Well-supplied markets are continuing to drive down prices of commodities, across the board, says the latest issue of the World Bank’s Commodity Markets Outlook (CMO), released today. Most indices edged further down during the first quarter of 2015, with food down 7.3 percent, crude oil down 13 percent and metals down 9 percent compared to the fourth quarter of 2014. Prices are expected to stay weak for the rest of this year, with only a…

Read More

African Inflation Snapshot: March 2015

African Inflation Snapshot: March 2015

Angola’s inflation rises to 7.87 percent: Angola’s consumer inflation edged up to 7.87 percent year-on-year in March from 7.73 percent in February, according to data from the statistics office. On a month-on-month basis, prices rose 0.63 percent after a 0.76 percent increase previously. Botswana’s CPI remains unchanged at 2.8 percent: Botswana’s consumer inflation was steady at 2.8 percent year-on-year in March from the previous month, according to data from the statistics office. Whereas inflation increased…

Read More

Despite the End of the Commodity Boom, African Countries Can Sustain Their Growth

Despite the End of the Commodity Boom, African Countries Can Sustain Their Growth

The World Bank Group forecasts that economic growth for African countries will slow in 2015 to 4.0 percent from 4.5 percent in 2014, a downturn which largely reflects the sharp fall in global prices for oil and other key commodities. At a seminar with African finance ministers, central bankers and their delegations during the World Bank Group Spring Meetings, the Bank’s Africa Chief Economist Francisco Ferreira explained that his 2015 forecast was below the 4.4…

Read More
1 80 81 82 83 84 88