Nigeria’s economic performance has weakened since the previous Nigeria Development Update (NDU) was published in June 2022 under the title of “The Continuing Urgency of Business Unusual”.

The global economic environment has weakened. Economic activity in most major economies has slowed in 2022 amid high inflation and central banks shifting toward contractionary monetary policies. External financing conditions, particularly for governments and private borrowers in frontier markets such as Nigeria, have tightened, as the US dollar has appreciated sharply against most other currencies to historically strong levels, and global benchmark interest rates have risen. Moving into 2023, growth in most regions is expected to weaken further, and uncertainty regarding the outlook remains elevated, partly because of key unknowns such as future developments related to the Russian Federation's invasion of Ukraine.