World Bank grants one year extension of NG-CARES programme
By Sodiq Adelakun
The Minister of State for Budget and National Planning, Prince Clem Agba yesterday, announced that the World Bank has granted a one-year extension of the Nigeria Cares (NG-CARE) programme.
The NG-CARES is an economic palliative programme set up to cushion the effects of the worldwide COVID-19 Pandemic on the fortunes of Micro Small and Medium Scale Enterprises.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) just last week declared that the Coronavirus scourge is over.
Agba, who stated this at the Beni edition of the Ministerial Town Hall Meeting for beneficiaries of the scheme from Edo, Delta, Bayelsa and Rivers States, said that there was also approval to give cash advancement to the 36 states of the federation since many of them would be getting new governors and the cash crunch occasioned by COVID-19 would affect many of them.
The State Minister noted that the pandemic brought a clot in the economic activities of the people and depleted resources by about 52 per cent, added that at a time during the pandemic, Nigeria was forced to sell its crude oil at 12 dollars per barrel; stressing that even if the pandemic was over as declared by the WHO, “the effects are still with us.”
To mitigate against the effects, Agba said that the Federal Government came up with sustainable action plans to keep the people alive, adding that one of such plans was the shutting down of the economy to prevent the spread of the pandemic.
According to him, “The effects of COVID-19 still live with us, and that is where the NG-CARES program is still very apt. So, we all recall that the COVID-19 pandemic, which ravaged many economies in the world, had devastating consequences on the livelihoods of the poor and vulnerable individuals, formal and informal businesses, especially Micro, Small Enterprises. So, it was very, very important that this livelihood should be kept alive, that people are able to keep their jobs at least if not creating new ones.
“We gave N1billion to each state during Covid with the exception of Lagos that got 10, Kano got a little more and the FCT because those are epicentres of the pandemic, we still have to get the $750 million World Bank loan to support the states in three basic areas.
“We had a flooding problem last year and it did affect our food security and the supply chains for food so we had to approach the World Bank and say let’s extend this project for another year to June 2024 and I am glad that the task team leaders communicated back to me that we now have approval for that, and the official letter will come to me next week from the World Bank.
“I have also sought another approval and that has been approved because I realised that the transition is so near. By May 29th, you are going to have new sets of governors in most parts of the country and for governors to be struggling through limited funding that they have and how to appropriate all of this and considering the fact that we are extending this program by one year, I have also gotten the approval from the bank to do another set of advanced disbursement to the 36 states so the Federal Government wishes once again to restate its commitment to restoring the livelihoods of poor and vulnerable Nigerians and maintain food security and facilitate the recovery of MSMEs,” Agba disclosed.
The high point of the event was the testimony of the beneficiaries where they expressed how far the project helped them to recover and build their businesses post-COVID-19.
