A World Bank report has revealed that Nigeria’s low budgetary allocation to social protection has had virtually no effect on reducing poverty, with the country spending only 0.14% of its Gross Domestic Product (GDP)—far below the global average of 1.5% and the Sub-Saharan African average of 1.1%.
Titled “The State of Social Safety Nets in Nigeria”, the November 2025 report highlights that despite numerous government programmes, including cash transfers and school feeding initiatives, poverty reduction remains negligible, with social protection schemes lowering the national poverty headcount by just 0.4 percentage points.
The World Bank attributes the weak impact to poor programme design, low benefit levels, and inadequate targeting, noting that many of Nigeria’s poorest households are larger than average, meaning benefits are spread thinly among more family members. For instance, a family of eight may receive the same cash transfer as a family of three, reducing the effectiveness of the assistance.
The report also raised concerns over Nigeria’s heavy reliance on foreign donors, with development assistance accounting for about 60% of federal spending on safety-net programmes between 2015 and 2021, including over 90% from the World Bank itself. Such dependence, the bank warns, makes the country vulnerable to funding shortfalls.
While overall coverage is low, certain programmes show promise. The National Social Safety Nets Programme (NASSP), which uses the National Social Registry to identify and target households, has achieved more meaningful results, reducing poverty by 4.3 percentage points and the poverty gap by 4.2 percentage points among its beneficiaries—nearly ten times more effective than all other safety-net programmes combined.
The report criticizes fragmented implementation and poor targeting across other programmes, including the National Home-Grown School Feeding Programme (NHGSFP), which only reaches children in grades 1–3 and covers a limited number of schools. Consequently, only 44% of benefits from social safety-net schemes actually reach poor Nigerians, even though they constitute 56% of beneficiaries.
Despite government efforts, including the recent digital cash-grant scheme targeting 15 million households, the bank underscores the need for better targeting, larger benefits, and sustainable domestic financing to make social protection a meaningful tool against poverty.
The World Bank concludes that, if well-targeted programmes are scaled up, they could significantly improve poverty reduction and inequality, using the NASSP as a ready-made platform for more effective social assistance across Nigeria.
