Nigeria’s economy officially entered into recession as real gross domestic product (GDP) contracted for the second consecutive quarter by 3.62 percent year on year (YoY) in the third quarter (Q3) of 2020.
The contraction follows a 6.10 percent YoY contraction in the second quarter, statistician-General Yemi Kale said Saturday in a report released on Twitter.
The decline in economic output was driven by sustained contractions in both the Oil (-13.89% YoY) and the Non-oil (-2.51% YoY) sectors.
However, there was relative improvement in non-oil GDP relative to Q2’20 (6.05% YoY). Cumulatively, economic output for the first 9 months of the year shrunk by 2.48 percent YoY.
Oil production fell to 1.67 million barrels a day from 1.81 million barrels in the previous three months. The International Monetary Fund (IMF) forecasts Nigerian GDP will contract by 4.3 percent this year, the biggest drop nearly four decades.