The Nigeria Community Action for Resilience and Economic Stimulus (NG-CARES) said that over nine million Nigerians have benefited from the initiative.

NG-CARES’s national coordinator, Abdulkarim Obaje, stated this during the fifth Zonal Peer Learning and Experience Sharing Event in Akure.

Mr Obaje expressed hope that the initiative was poised to eradicate poverty and bring positive transformation among Nigerians.

“The number of beneficiaries of the intervention is well over 9 million beneficiaries. NG-CARES is poised to assist the state and federal governments to eradicate poverty in Nigeria. So, the programme has been restructured in terms of scope to cover more vulnerable Nigerians. And it has done very, very well.

“The indication of how well it has done is the fact that state governors are requesting the World Bank, through the federal government, to give additional financing, which has also been approved to the tune of $500 million.

“We are moving from state to state on a zonal basis, and we are also interacting with beneficiaries. Many of the beneficiaries are giving us testimonies of how the NG-CARES programme has impacted them. So the purpose of this learning event, as has been repeatedly stated, is to share learning experience,” he stated.

He commended state governments for spending over N150 billion on the programme.

NG-Cares’s task team leader for the World Bank, Lire Ersado, said that the World Bank had expended $750 million on the programme. Mr Ersado explained that the project had impacted the lives of many Nigerians.

He stated that the programme’s first phase would end in December with direct and indirect beneficiaries amounting to 30 million.

According to him, it has helped many farmers to increase their productivity in the country. 

Mr Ersado announced that the second phase would receive $500 million from the World Bank. He said the programme was structured so politicians could not hijack it.

The Commissioner for Budget and Economic Planning, Emmanuel Igbasan, said that the NG-CARES performed exceptionally well among other World Bank-supported interventions in the country.

Mr Igbasan said that despite the success, stakeholders needed to move the programme to an enviable height. He added that the federal government and the Nigeria Governors Forum must continue to synergise on how to deepen further the collaboration with the World Bank for the sustainability of the NG-CARES. 

(NAN)