By Mariam Abeeb
The Minister of State for Finance, Dr Doris Uzoka-Anite has said that it would require sustained annual growth of between 10 per cent and 12 per cent over the next decade to reach the one-trillion-dollar mark.
Mrs Uzoka-Anite made this known at the Annual General Meeting, AGM, of the Finance Correspondents Association of Nigeria, FICAN, in Abuja.
She has reiterated the Federal Government’s commitment to actualising President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s one trillion-dollar economy.
The theme of the meetingwas, “Realising Tinubu’s One Trillion Dollars Economic Agenda”.
The minister, who was represented by the ministry’s Assistant Director of Media and Public Relations, Uloma Amadi, described the target as “a specific, measurable destination” rather than a slogan”.
She said that the reforms had a solid foundation for sustained double-digit growth.
Mrs Uzoka-Anite said that the country’s Gross Domestic Product, GDP, was currently estimated at about 375 billion dollars.
She said that it would require sustained annual growth of between 10 per cent and 12 per cent over the next decade to reach the one-trillion-dollar mark.
“That is an ambitious target, and this administration is not shy about saying so. Ambitious targets are what move nations.
“Upon assumption of office in 2023, this administration inherited an economy marked by structural distortions.
These include a fuel subsidy regime that gulped over five trillion annually and a multiple exchange rate system that undermined investor confidence,” she said.
According to her, the removal of the fuel subsidy and the unification of the foreign exchange market were difficult but necessary steps to restore market integrity.
“Both decisions imposed short-term pain, neither decision has been reversed. Today, those reforms are being vindicated by the data.
“The January 2026 decision by S&P global ratings to revise the country’s outlook to positive while its B-/B credit ratings, attributing it to measurable improvements in the country’s fiscal, external and monetary positions,” Mrs Uzoka-Anite said.
She said that the government had restructured the budget framework to distinguish clearly between recurrent and investment expenditure, with emphasis on channeling resources toward infrastructure and growth-enhancing projects.
“We are now asking not just how much we are spending, but what we are building with what we spend,” she said.
The minister said that the second phase of reforms, anchored on the Disinflation and Growth Acceleration Strategy (DGAS), was designed to unlock productive capacity and deliver non-inflationary growth of over seven per cent by 2027.
She said that DGAS, developed in collaboration with the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, was built on nine pillars.
The minister listed the pillars to include Capital mobilisation through development finance instruments, sectoral acceleration in agriculture, energy, technology and manufacturing, and nationwide energy expansion.
Others are digital infrastructure development and large-scale human capital training.
She said that the strategy also prioritised an expanded consumer credit platform to enable Nigerians access structured financing for housing, healthcare, education and other essential needs.
According to her, about 70 per cent of raw materials used in local industrial production are imported, adding that the needed to be reversed.
Mrs Uzoka-Anite said that the Dangote Refinery was an example of the benefits of domestic processing of resources, saying similar models would be replicated across agriculture, mining, health and manufacturing.
“The removal of the country from the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) grey list underscored strengthened anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism financing frameworks, thereby enhancing investor confidence”.
The minister said that the country had submitted its ECOWAS tariff offer under the African Continental Free Trade Area, AfCFTA, committing to zero duties on 90 per cent of goods traded within Africa
She said that the move was strategic, repositioning in an evolving global trade environment .
