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🇳🇬 Nigeria /Economy & Trade

GDP report: Nigerian manufacturers warn of widening gap between headline growth and real-sector vitality

From ThisDay · () English

Translated from English and summarized by DistantNews. Read the original for the full story.

At a glance

News Named sources Context piece
  • Nigeria’s real GDP grew 4.43% year on year in the second quarter of 2026, but the Manufacturers Association of Nigeria said the expansion remained dominated by services.
  • MAN said overall industrial growth fell from 7.46% in the second quarter of 2025 to 3.96%, while manufacturing’s share of real GDP declined from 9.57% in the first quarter of 2026 to 7.72% in the second.
  • The group attributed the industrial weakness to costs including exchange-rate pressures, high interest rates and electricity tariffs, and said growth in refining and cement was concentrated in capital-intensive sectors.

Nigeria’s headline economic growth is masking a deepening industrial squeeze, according to the Manufacturers Association of Nigeria. The group says the latest figures show an economy expanding without enough strength in the factories and other productive sectors that create broad employment.

Real GDP grew 4.43% year on year in the second quarter of 2026, up from 3.89% in the first quarter and 4.23% in the same quarter a year earlier. But services accounted for 56.62% of GDP, while the broader industrial sector represented 17.23%. MAN said the pattern pointed to growth driven disproportionately by services rather than domestic production.

The Q2 2026 GDP performance serves as a reminder that sustainable national prosperity must be anchored in active domestic manufacturing, not just service consumption and extraction.

· Manufacturers Association of NigeriaMAN used the GDP figures to argue that Nigeria needs stronger domestic manufacturing.

The association said overall industrial growth had nearly halved, falling from 7.46% in the second quarter of 2025 to 3.96% in the latest quarter. Manufacturing grew 3.24% in real terms, only slightly below 3.29% in the first quarter, but its share of real GDP dropped sharply from 9.57% to 7.72% in a single quarter.

We must raise a critical alarm about the precipitous plunge in overall industrial growth.

· Manufacturers Association of NigeriaThe association highlighted the fall in industrial growth between the second quarters of 2025 and 2026.

MAN linked the erosion to severe cost pressures facing manufacturers, including a high exchange rate, what it called “outrageous interest rates” and expensive electricity tariffs. Electricity, gas, steam and air-conditioning supply recorded the steepest contraction among the cited industrial areas, at negative 10.63%.

The association also pointed to a split within manufacturing. Growth was concentrated in capital-intensive and heavy industrial activities, with oil refining up 43.94% and cement up 12.75%, while sectors that employ more people were stalling or weakening. MAN warned that services and extraction alone could not build durable prosperity, strengthen foreign-exchange reserves, reduce structural inflation or create sustainable mass industrial jobs.

A nation that trades and consumes what it does not produce builds prosperity on quicksand.

· Manufacturers Association of NigeriaMAN criticised reliance on services and extraction rather than domestic production.
About this summary

Originally published by ThisDay in English. Translated, summarized, and contextualized automatically by DistantNews, with a note on how the source frames the story. Not individually reviewed before publishing. How this works.

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