The Director-General for Nigeria’s National Information Technology Development Agency, or NITDA, has said that the country could potentially expect a revenue stream between $6 billion to 10 billion from blockchain technology in the next ten years. According to a Nov. 5 announcement from the NITDA, Director-General Kashifu Inuwa spoke at a stakeholders meeting in the Nigerian capital of Abuja to review the agency’s National Blockchain Adoption Strategy Framework. A draft of the strategy was first released in October and stated that blockchain and decentralized ledger technology (DLT) would “facilitate the development of the Nigerian digital economy.”
“We want Nigeria to be strategically placed to capture value from this economic potential of blockchain,” stated Inuwa. “Looking at our youthful population, which is mainly digitally native and with our position in Africa, we are looking at how we can get at least around six to 10 billion dollars by the year 2030.”
“Blockchain is going to play a key role in terms of creating, tracing products and services.”
Inuwa cited an October study from PricewaterhouseCoopers which found that blockchain technology — through its wide range of use cases — would potentially add $1.76 trillion to the global gross domestic product in the next 10 years, making it 1.4% of the global GDP in 2030. He stated that Nigeria could incorporate the technology through its provincial services, payment services, digital identity, customer engagement, and contract and dispute resolution applications.
“We see the need for us to position our country well so we can capture value from the blockchain.”
Nigeria has been one of the countries at the forefront of crypto and blockchain adoption in Africa. A May report from Arcane Research determined that the country had the second-highest percentage of cryptocurrency ownership or use among internet users in Africa at 11%. In September, the nation’s Securities and Exchange Commission officially defined digital assets under its regulatory umbrella.
Recently, the country has been in the spotlight as crypto donations have been used by a group of Nigerian feminists to help fund protests against the police’s Special Anti-Robbery Squad, or SARS. Thousands of Nigerians have taken to the streets since early October to protest police brutality in the country, calling for SARS to be disbanded.