Investment in Agriculture and Extractive Industry: A Panacea for National Development

Abstract

Economic diversification into agriculture and extractive industry in Nigeria has been a fascinating and crucial economic issue that deserves consideration especially as the country is shifting from mono-economy (caused by oil boom) to other viable economic sectors. The global economic meltdown and depression have stimulated countries to look into other sectors of the economy in order to enhance their national development. Hence, this study tries to examine the contribution of agriculture and extractive industry to the Nigeria’s real gross domestic product (RGDP). The study makes use of time series data gathered from CBN Statistical Bulletin ranging from 1981-2017 and employs Ordinary Least Squares (OLS) method as the statistical tool with the aid of e-views version 9. The findings reveal that agriculture has a robust and noteworthy positive impact on RGDP while the solid mineral equally has a substantial positive influence on RGDP. However, crude petroleum (proxy for crude petroleum & natural gas) has a positive inconsequential effect on RGDP. This brings the study to a conclusion that investment in agriculture and solid minerals is highly imperative at the moment. Therefore, the study has suggested that economic diversification should be focused more on agriculture and solid mineral extraction. In addition, the government should try to manage the crude petroleum and natural gas exploration so as to prevent fund repatriation and transfer to other countries due to borrowed technology.