Experts Proffer Ways To Tame Rising Inflation

Some financial experts have urged the Federal Government to adopt stable macroeconomic policies that would stimulate the growth of more domestic production.

They also said that addressing the food insecurity challenges was pivotal in curbing the inflation increases in the economy.

They said this in separate interviews with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Lagos on Sunday.

The chief executive officer, Ogu investment, Mr Moses Igbrude, said the federal government could check the inflation by ensuring the country becomes a hub for different productions.

“The government should immediately implement friendly fiscal and monetary policies that will accelerate the growth of domestic producers.

“Then the country could manufacture, locally, many imported commodities and enhance domestic capacity in the process,” Igbrude said.

According to him, to tackle the inflation rate, the Central  Bank of Nigeria (CBN) should endeavour to allocate more foreign exchange to deal with illiquidity issues.

“The inability of genuine businesses to access foreign exchange from the official windows, despite its unification currently is impeding their growth.

“This distortion is quite detrimental to the economy and partially responsible for the increasing cost of production,” Igbrude said.

In his view, a lecturer of Economics, Pan Atlantic University, Dr Austine Nwaeze, said the government should tackle the food insecurity responsible for the rising inflation rate.

“The tiers of government needed to collaborate more and gather actionable intelligence in order to mitigate the insecurity challenges in many farming communities.

“Then more young people should be encouraged to engage in mechanised farming without reservations,”Nwaeze said.

He noted that the federal government should address the economic fundamentals to curb rising inflation.

“The government needed to invest more in key infrastructure, such as uninterrupted electricity, while a functioning rail system connected to the sea ports is imperative for cheaper transportation cost,” Nwaeze said.

Also, the President of  Standard Shareholders Association of Nigeria (SSAN), Mr Godwin Anono, said the federal government could check the rising inflation by ensuring that the plan to subsidise transportation cost was well implemented.

“The federal government could collaborate with other sub-nationals to manage its introduced transportation schemes that will convey their people half the prices.

“Especially from the urban areas to the  hinterland were majority of the people resides,” Anono said.

He noted that the federal government should have more housing schemes to reduce the economic difficulties caused by the spike in inflation rate.

NAN reports that Nigeria’s annual inflation rate rose to 25.80 per cent in August from 24.08 per cent in the previous month.

The statistics office said the August headline inflation rate shows an increase of 1.72 per cent points when compared to the July headline inflation rate.

The NBS said on a year-on-year basis, the headline inflation rate was 5.27 per cent points higher compared to the rate recorded in August 2022, which was 20.52 per cent.

According to the report, the food inflation rate in August quickened to 29.34 per cent on a year-on-year basis, which was 6.22 per cent points higher compared to the rate recorded in August (23.12 per cent )