Social investments refer to public policies and programmes designed to protect people from poverty and economic shocks, while expanding opportunities for transitioning out of poverty. These initiatives typically involve non-contributory transfers in cash or kind, paired with services that enhance capabilities and livelihoods. They are often described them as social safety net instruments that help households manage risk and volatility, protect them from falling deeper into poverty, and, when designed well, connect them to pathways for advancement. This, at least for Nigeria, is the crux of the conversation: the pathway for advancement out of poverty.
According to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), approximately 133 million Nigerians were living in multidimensional poverty as of 2022. Additionally, the World Bank’s Nigeria Development Update (October 2025) projects that 61% of Nigerians were living in poverty in 2025, up from 40% in 2019 and 56% in 2023, due to past policy missteps, external shocks, and recent adjustment costs. The questions, then, are: what must the government do to reduce these numbers? Would the current cash handouts, as designed and delivered, produce a real and long-term impact on beneficiaries, providing them with a pathway out of poverty? Are there more innovative and sustainable approaches that can change the narrative in practical and timely ways?
Nigeria’s recent record shows meaningful effort. The social protection framework has expanded, with an estimated ₦1.34 trillion invested across various social protection programmes between 2016 and 2022, according to the World Bank. More recently, progress has been made in tightening identity-linked payment rails introduced in recent schemes. The current flagship is the $800 million Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT) Scale-Up 2, designed to reach 15 million households with ₦25,000 a month paid in 3 tranches (₦75,000 in total). Government figures as of September 2025 indicate that approximately 8.5 million households have received at least one tranche, with others receiving two or three, with a push underway to complete the remaining households before the end of 2025. This represents approximately N330 billion already disbursed, providing evidence of scale in terms of the number of beneficiaries, positive intent, and efficiency in handling the operational complexity of moving money securely to the poorest at speed.
States have also expanded their roles through the years, setting up social protection units, agricultural input and market-linkage support programmes, health insurance schemes, school feeding initiatives, and skills and enterprise development programmes, taking giant steps towards a more robust and functional safety net landscape.
Still, some gaps persist with uneven service standards and limited emphasis on whether households sustain gains (assuming there were real gains) once support ends. Targeting has improved, but recertification and graduation processes are not yet established and entrenched within the current framework and programme design. In fact, in terms of national investments in social safety programmes, Nigeria ranks very low, committing only 0.7% of GDP to safety nets (as of 2021), compared to the 1.2% average in sub-Saharan Africa and the 1.5% global average of developing and transition countries, meaning that our safety nets are relatively thin when it comes to coverage and benefit adequacy, limited in capacity to turn relief into real-sector impact and sustainable economic outcomes for beneficiaries.
Closely related to this is the broader economic context. Despite some progress, growth has been slow. Even with a mid-2025 easing of headline inflation following the rebasing of the Consumer Price Index (CPI), food prices remain elevated and continue to erode real incomes. For many families, the pattern is repetitive: a short period of relief is followed by a shock, such as price spikes, illness, job loss, or insecurity, that quickly wipes out whatever progress was made. In effect, the current system mitigates hardship in the moment but rarely builds the buffers, protections, and income pathways that enable households to absorb routine shocks and keep advancing economically. The question here is why?
Part of the answer lies in how our social investments have been framed and what they’ve funded. Over time, programmes have focused on short-term, time-bound transfers aimed at subsidising household consumption expenditures. The current CCT scheme is a prime example. The ₦75,000 payout is material in the moment but seldom connected to buffers or tools that outlast the payout, normalising survival without progress.
Let’s briefly look at the numbers. ₦75,000 is to be paid to each household in 3 tranches of ₦25,000 each. That translates to roughly ₦833 per day. According to the National Bureau of Statistics (2020), the average number of persons per household is 5 individuals. This means that, on average, each individual in the household receives just about ₦166 per day. Neither at the Household nor the individual level does the current design provide adequate consumptive support, nor does it provide the enablers for beneficiaries to build the buffers against shocks and unexpected negative turn of events, nor create for them a pathway out of poverty.
Globally, there are models that show what transition out of poverty can look like. The “Graduation Approach”, originating in South Asia and now adapted across Africa and Latin America, pairs time-bound support with a small set of practical enablers: a light productive asset or tool, coaching, savings discipline, and basic risk protection. Long-term evaluations suggest that persistent gains are achieved years after support ends, precisely because households acquire both a floor (the cash transfer) and a ladder (the enablers). A 2015 study conducted in 6 different countries and published by the American Society of the Advancement of Science showed that the Graduation approach delivers sustained gains in assets, earnings, food security, and health years after support ends (Side note: Kaduna State, in partnership with Innovation for Poverty Action, has launched the first Graduation Programme in Nigeria. We wait to see the results of the intervention and the possibilities/opportunities for scale and wider implementation across Nigeria).
Conditional cash programmes in Latin America offer complementary lessons. Mexico’s Prospera (formerly Progresa/Opportunidades) and Brazil’s Bolsa Família targeted human capital development/protection, beyond basic consumption; the best evidence associates them with reductions in poverty and improvements in health and schooling when they run steadily and predictably, and when systems around them, such as schools, clinics, and labour markets, work well. When programmes are abruptly rolled back, outcomes can slip, a reminder that predictability matters as much as generosity. Ethiopia’s Productive Safety Net Programme adds another pillar: predictable transfers tied to public works and livelihoods support have been linked to improved food security and asset protection in drought-prone contexts, resilience by design rather than by chance.
So, what have our investments produced so far in Nigeria, beyond reach and integrity? Poverty remains widespread; health shocks remain financially ruinous for many; learning outcomes in basic education are fragile; farm households face volatile input and output markets, further compounded by climate variability and environmental stress; and in finance, we’ve raised access faster than we’ve built habits, buffers, and trust. A transfer that arrives on time is a success for the system, but if it is cashed out the same day, if no emergency balance or basic cover is set aside, and if households have no route to tools or markets that create or raise earnings, then we shouldn’t be surprised when the next shock sends families back to zero. The current architecture in Nigeria appears to prioritise measuring enrolments and payments; it rarely verifies income stability, shock absorption, or the safe and regular use of simple tools that keep accounts active. The result is relief without resilience. Moreso, the gap is compounded by the wider service environment. The education, primary health, and other local community-based services that should provide basic cushioning support are often unreliable where available. Without outcome-focused designs and supportive public services, short, time-bound transfers are quickly consumed by these frictions, leaving little to feed, build buffers or invest in livelihood.
How much does it take to move a household out of poverty? There is no single number. Adequacy depends on the size of the intervention relative to the shock, local prices, earning opportunities, and household composition. The more useful question is: what combination of supports changes trajectories at a reasonable cost?
The following balancing levers are recommended.
- First, build resilience through small tools, such as an emergency buffer and basic microinsurance coverage for health or assets, helps prevent setbacks from erasing gains.
- Second, a practical livelihood linkage that raises earnings a little and steadily, whether through input vouchers, vendor-financed light equipment, or off-taker arrangements in local value chains.
- Third, investing in cost-effective and potentially free supporting infrastructure and service systems to balance household expenditure and enable functional savings within households. This would serve much more people beyond those on the social registers and deliver wider benefits to the communities.
From an operational point of view, it is essential that the National Social Register remains active and that the process of updating it is dynamic enough to enable the tracking of movements in and out of the targeted poverty bracket; some have advocated for the creation of walk-in centres within communities. This can be managed by local government councils in liaison with the State Operations Coordinating Units (SOCUs), as currently established. Additionally, for the sake of further transparency and uniformity, the indicators or measures of poverty should be unified and applied consistently across all communities. This will ensure fair comparisons across locations, sharpen targeting and resource allocation, and make programme performance easier to audit and evaluate over time. It would also reduce politicisation of figures, improve accountability to beneficiaries, and support evidence-based adjustments when conditions change.
Relief will always matter. In a country managing price pressures, climate risks, and insecurity, transfers can be the difference between coping and crisis. But relief is the starting line, not the finish. If we take the next step of designing our social investments to also build a buffer, activate basic protection, and open a door to livelihoods, then Nigeria can begin to deliver what citizens expect: not just money in an account, but a fairer shot at stability and progress.
