Economy: GDP grows by 2.84% – NBS

The Nigerian economy grew by 2.84 per cent in the third quarter of the year (Q3 2015) compared with 2.35 per cent in the previous quarter, the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) has said.
According to the GDP third quarter report released Monday by the statistical agency, the country’s growth rate for Q3 was higher by 0.49 per cent compared to the previous quarter but lower by 3.38 per cent in the corresponding quarter of 2014.
Quarter-on-quarter, the real GDP increased by 9.19 per cent, according to NBS.
Nominal GDP at basic prices increased to N24.31 trillion compared to N22.85 trillion in Q2 and N21.04 trillion in the first quarter.
Compared to the N22.93 trillion recorded in Q3 2014, nominal GDP increased by 6.02 per cent.
Nominal growth was also higher relative to the growth recorded in Q1 2015 by 0.85 per cent.
Crude oil production in Q3 also increased by 0.17 million barrels per day (mbpd) to 2.17 mbpd from 2.15 mbpd in Q2 2015.
According to NBS, real growth of the oil sector increased by 1.06 per cent (year-on-year) in Q3 2015, higher by 4.65 per cent compared to the corresponding quarter of 2014, and higher than the second quarter when growth declined by 6.79 per cent.
Quarter-on-quarter, growth also increased by 14.35 per cent. As a share of the economy, the oil sector represented 10.27 per cent of total GDP, down by 0.18 per cent from the corresponding period of 2014 and up by 0.46 per cent up from the second quarter of 2015.
NBS stated that the non-oil sector grew by 3.05 per cent in real terms in Q3, adding that growth in the sector was largely driven by crop production (agriculture), financial services, telecommunications and trade, among others.
However, this was 4.45 per cent lower than the corresponding quarter in 2014 and marginally lower than Q2 2015 estimates.
In real terms, the non-oil sector contributed 89.73 per cent to the nation’s GDP, marginally higher than the 89.55 per cent in Q3 2014 but lower than the 90.20 per cent recorded in Q2 2015.