Economic Development Challenges SS3 Economics Lesson Note

SPECIFIC OBJECTIVES: At the end of the lesson, pupils should be able to

1. Discuss some of Nigeria’s economic challenges and methods of curbing them

INSTRUCTIONAL TECHNIQUES: 

• Identification, 
• explanation, 
• questions and answers, 
• demonstration, 
• videos from source

INSTRUCTIONAL MATERIALS: 

• Videos, 
• loudspeaker, 
• textbook, 
• pictures

NOTE

NIGERIA’S ECONOMIC CHALLENGES

1. POVERTY

Nigeria has a lot of economic challenges, chief among which is poverty.

Poverty is a state of extreme impoverishment and lack. In other words, people are categorised as poor when they are unable to afford necessities for themselves.

In Nigeria, millions of people are poor; completely unable to afford basic needs of everyday living such as food, housing and clothing. The situation seems to get worse every passing day and unfortunately, the Government has not taken any actual [functional] steps towards addressing it.

 Effects of poverty

1. Malnutrition: People living in poverty do not have access to quality/nutritious food and if they do have access to quality food, they do not have the economic power to get it.
2. Poor health: when a child does not take nutritious food. It therefore means such a child is prone to disease as the body does have the ability to fight off disease. When such a disease is noticed, there are no financial resources to go to the hospital.
3. Lack of Education: Many people living in poverty do not attend school, even when the school is free, they do not have the financial muscles to buy educational materials, school uniforms etc.
4. Undeveloped Economy: without an education, likely, people will not be able to get a job and when people are not working the economy suffers as they are not contributing their quota to the development of the economy.
5. Social Vices: Social vices like stealing, killing etc have a direct relationship with poverty. An increase in poverty level leads to an increase in social vices. Many people living in poverty are homeless and stay on the street which may lead to social unrest taking over the society

 Poverty Alleviation Agencies

1. NAPEP: The National Poverty Eradication Programme is a 2001 program by the Nigerian government aimed at addressing poverty in Nigeria and related issues.  Its objectives are as follows-
2. Training youth in vocational trade
3. Graduate internship
4. Creating employment
5. Giving micro-credit to small and medium-scale enterprises.
6. NDE: The National Directorate of Employment was established in 1986 by the then Babangida military administration to combat mass unemployment. It focuses on-
7. Vocational skill development
8. Entrepreneurship development
9. Agricultural Development
10. Public work programmes

 Methods of Alleviating Poverty

Methods of poverty alleviation are the activities embarked upon by governments and NGOs with the aim of either alleviating poverty in a country or reducing it to its barest minimum. Some of these measures include-

1. Creation of employment: Giving employment to those who are willing and able to work makes it possible for them to earn income and as such be able to afford the necessities of life.
2. Training: Training individuals will help them acquire basic vocational skills which will ultimately make them self-employed and as such be able to earn money and be able to afford necessities.
3. Microcredit: Giving small credit to people who have entrepreneurial skills to start a business will assist in a long way as they can use profit made to get necessities and also plough part of the profit back into the business,
4. Provision of infrastructure: Provision of social infrastructure like electricity, good road networks etc will encourage investors to come to the country to establish and by extension increase the level of employment which will reduce the level of poverty in the country.

 2. HIV/AIDS and the Economy

HIV/AIDS is a sexually transmitted disease which can also be gotten through other means. The illness (when left undetected and managed early), can affect the physical capacity and productivity of sufferers.  In this regard, therefore, HIV/AIDS adversely affects the economy in the sense that resources are deployed towards catering for those with the disease. As commendable as it is to take care of people who are sick, it has an opportunity cost.

 3. CORRUPTION AND THE ECONOMY

Corruption is the act of knowingly taking what does not belong to you or putting oneself in a position of an undue/illegal advantage over another person. Corruption can be in different forms but whichever form it takes, it harms the economy. Let us take a situation where a government official steals public funds that could have been used to better the lots of citizens through road construction, power generation etc. Please note that corruption is not only financial or economic; it can also be attitudinal like selling of votes etc.

4. POWER AND ENERGY INADEQUACY’ AND THE ECONOMY

Power is critical to the development of any economy. Many companies in Nigeria have closed down their business operations as a result of erratic power supply and the huge cost of generating electricity for themselves. This has in in turn resulted in increased unemployment, which in turn led to increased social vices. Nigeria currently generates less than 5000 MW as opposed to the minimum 20000MW required to reasonably power the whole country. The [un]bundling of the power sector into three main components namely Generation, Transmission and Distribution has not helped to increase the rate of power supply and we hope things improve in the long run

EVALUATION

1. Discuss three economic challenges prevalent in Nigeria and proffer solutions to them

CLASSWORK: As in evaluation

CONCLUSION: The teacher commends the students positively