By Gbadamosi Oladimeji
Vice President Yemi Osinbajo believes providing support to small businesses in the informal sector should be a priority for all economies aiming at lessening the adverse effect of the pandemic on the economy.
Mr Osinbajo disclosed this on Wednesday at a virtual conference entitled “How Africa’s Informal Sector Reacts to COVID-19”, in Abuja.
“Perhaps, we have the advantage of being able to manage our problems in smaller measure, or by dividing them. Of course, we run a federation, which means that Gov. Nasir could do some very excellent work there in Kaduna, Lagos could do some excellent work, Ogun State and others could also do some excellent work,” Osinbajo stated.
“But of course, by the very nature of this pandemic, it also means that you run the risk of everything going South if some State isn’t doing as well as it ought to.”
“I think, in the end, we have that advantage that we are able to almost isolate responses, and even look at best practices across the various states and try and ramp up wherever we find that there are deficiencies,” he added.
Speaking specifically about some of the measures that are currently being implemented to mitigate the impact of the pandemic on the economy, the Vice President said, “We have done a lot on conditional transfers, especially within the context of our social investment policies, but we are now looking at how to possibly enlarge the scope of that and do more.
“We are looking beyond using cash transfers as if it were some incentive for staying at home. We are trying to see whether this can address some of the increasing problems of poverty that we are likely to find now, given the disruptions in the economy,” he said.
“Aside from the lockdown, just the disruption in the economy has meant that the daily paid worker simply has no means of working and many laid off,” he added.
