FOR THE RECORDS: BILL GATES’ SPEECH THAT RATTLED NIGERIAN GOVT (FULL TEXT)
FOR THE
RECORDS: BILL GATES’ SPEECH THAT RATTLED NIGERIAN GOVT (FULL TEXT)
Aliko Dangote,
Bill Gates (middle) and Vice President Yemi Osinbajo
Speech by Bill Gates, Co-Chair of
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, at the National Economic Council
Aso Rock
Presidential Villa, Abuja
Thursday
March 22, 2018
10.20am
WAT
Your
Excellency Muhamadu Buhari, President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria;
Professor Yemi Osinbajo, Vice President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria;
Senator Bukola Saraki, Senate President; Honorable Yakubu Dogara, Speaker of
the House; Your Excellencies, executive governors of the Federal Republic of
Nigeria; Royal fathers; Distinguished ladies and gentlemen; and as you say in
Nigeria, all other protocols observed.
Thank you
for welcoming me to Nigeria. I’ve been coming here regularly since 2006, and
I’ve always felt welcome. Nigerians usually greet me warmly. The first time I
met the Sultan of Sokoto, I was honored that he greeted me with the gift of a
white horse.
At some
point during every visit, though, some brave person eventually asks me—very
politely—“Why are you actually here?” It’s an understandable question. Most
American technology guys don’t wander around Nigeria learning about its health
system. But I think I have a good answer.
When we
started Microsoft 40 years ago, we wanted to build a successful business, but
we also wanted to make people’s lives better. We believed computers could
revolutionize the way people lived and worked. But back then only big companies
could afford them. We wanted to give everybody access.
As I got
older, traveled more, and learned more about the world, I realized that
billions of people had a problem that computers couldn’t solve. They lacked the
basics of a good life: food, shelter, health, education, and opportunity.
And so I
started my second career with my wife Melinda. With the money I’d been lucky
enough to earn at Microsoft, we started working toward a different goal: a
healthy and productive life for everyone.
That’s why I come to Nigeria, and that’s why Melinda and I will continue coming
for as long as we are able. Our foundation’s biggest office in Africa is here.
We have committed over $1.6 billion in Nigeria so far, and we plan to increase
our commitment. We have strong relationships with the federal government, state
governments, businesses, NGOs, and civil society organizations. We are eager to
support you as you work to make Nigeria a global economic powerhouse that
provides opportunity for all its citizens—as you strive to fulfill this
country’s immense promise.
I’m blown
away by how much Nigeria has changed in the past decade. Consider the
technology sector. That energy I talked about during the early days of
Microsoft, our passion and our eagerness to take risks…. That’s the same energy
that powers technology hubs across Nigeria like Co-Creation and Enspire.
The
novelist Chimamanda Adichie, who my wife especially admires, captured the
country’s spirit when she said her fellow Nigerians have “big dreams and big
ambitions.”
This line
graph of Nigeria’s per capita GDP shows where those dreams and ambitions can
lead. With the exception of the recent recession, the slope goes straight up.
As a result of this growth, Nigeria is now the biggest economy on the
continent. You are rapidly approaching upper middle-income status, like Brazil,
China, and Mexico.
But growth
is not inevitable. Nigeria has unmatched economic potential, but what becomes
of that potential depends on the choices you make as Nigeria’s leaders.
The most
important choice you can make is to maximize your greatest resource, the
Nigerian people. Nigeria will thrive when every Nigerian is able to thrive.
If you
invest in their health, education, and opportunities—the “human capital” we are
talking about today—then they will lay the foundation for sustained prosperity.
If you don’t, however, then it is very important to recognize that there will
be a sharp limit on how much the country can grow.
You see
this risk in the data. From the point of view of the quality of life, much of
Nigeria still looks like a low-income country. Let me give a few examples.
· In upper
middle-income countries, the average life expectancy is 75 years. In lower
middle-income countries, it’s 68. In low-income countries, it’s 62. In Nigeria,
it is lower still: just 53 years.
· Nigeria is one of the most dangerous places in the world to give birth, with
the fourth worst maternal mortality rate in the world, ahead of only Sierra
Leone, Central African Republic, and Chad.
· One in
three Nigerian children is chronically malnourished.
I do not
enjoy speaking to you this bluntly when you have been gracious enough to invite
me here. But I am applying an important lesson I learned from Alhaji Aliko
Dangote. Recently, Aliko and I were having a conversation with several
governors about their states’ official immunization rates. Aliko’s way of
stressing the importance of accurate data was to tell us, “I didn’t get rich by
pretending to sell bags of cement I didn’t have.” I took from that that while
it may be easier to be polite, it’s more important to face facts so that you
can make progress.
On
immunization, you are already living that lesson: last year Nigeria revised its
immunization coverage numbers downward to reflect more accurate sources, and I
applaud you for those lower numbers. They may look worse, but they are more
real, which is the first step toward saving and improving more lives.
I urge you
to apply this thinking to all your investments in your people. The Nigerian
government’s Economic Recovery and Growth Plan identifies “investing in our
people” as one of three “strategic objectives.” But the “execution priorities”
don’t fully reflect people’s needs, prioritizing physical capital over human
capital.
To anchor
the economy over the long term, investments in infrastructure and competitiveness
must go hand in hand with investments in people. People without roads, ports,
and factories can’t flourish. And roads, ports, and factories without skilled
workers to build and manage them can’t sustain an economy.
In
preparation for my visit, I asked a research institute at the University of
Washington to model Nigeria’s economic growth under three scenarios related to
health and education, the core of how economists define human capital.
Here you
can see Nigeria’s per capita GDP growth from 2000 until today. If current
education and health trends continue—if you spend the same amount in these
areas and get the same results—per capita GDP flatlines, with economic growth
just barely keeping up with population growth.
If things
get worse, it will decline. Unfortunately, this scenario is a very real
possibility unless you intervene at both the federal and state levels. Because
even in the worst-case scenario, your national income level is about to make
you ineligible for certain kinds of development assistance and loans that
you’ve been relying on to fund your health system and other priorities. Without
more and better spent domestic money, investment in your people will decline by
default as donor money shrinks—a lose-lose scenario for everyone.
However,
if you commit to getting better results in health and education—if you spend
more and more effectively—per capita GDP will stay on its remarkable
pre-recession trajectory.
This is
the scenario we all want: Nigeria thrives because every Nigerian is able to
thrive. And the data makes it clear that this scenario is entirely within your
reach.
What do I
mean by investing in your people? I mean prioritizing health and education, the
factors included in the model I just showed you. I also mean continuing to open
up opportunities in the agriculture and microenterprise sectors, as the
government has proposed in the ERGP. I mean creating the conditions where
Nigerians can reach their goals while adding value to the economy—the win-win
scenario.
Our
foundation doesn’t invest directly in education here, but the World Bank World
Development Report that just came out makes it clear that education leads to
improvements in employment, productivity, and wages. Today, though, more than
half of rural Nigerian children can’t read and write. The conclusion is
inescapable: Nigeria’s economy tomorrow depends on improving its schools today.
The same is true of health, our foundation’s primary focus area. In 1978, Dr.
Olikoye Ransome-Kuti, who later became the Nigerian minister of health, helped
establish primary health care as the global standard. We now know that a strong
primary care system takes care of 90 percent of people’s health needs.
Tragically,
40 years after Dr. Ransome-Kuti helped other countries set a course for the
future, the Nigerian primary health care system is broken. The evidence for
this can be found in the epidemic of chronic malnutrition, or stunting. As the
name suggests, chronic malnutrition is not a disease children catch. It is a
condition that develops over time because they are deprived of a diverse diet
and the services a strong primary health care system provides.
The
consequences of stunting are devastating. Though stunted children are defined
as shorter than average, we’re not particularly concerned about their height.
What we’re concerned about is their brains, or what Akin Adesina calls “gray
matter infrastructure.”
This is a
picture of the brain of a single normally developing infant. And next to it is
a picture of the brain of a single chronically malnourished infant. Every brain
and every child are different, but you can clearly see the difference in the
number of neural connections in these two brains. And once this kind of damage
is done, it’s very hard to repair.
In
Nigeria, one in three children is chronically malnourished and could therefore
be at risk. This is a tragedy for each one of these children; it is also a huge
blow to the economy. According to the World Bank, addressing the stunting
crisis in Nigeria would add almost $30 billion to the GDP. So what will it take
to solve stunting? It will take a focus on agricultural development, nutrition,
and primary health care.
A
functioning primary health system has six features.
· Adequate
funding.
· Good
facilities located in the right places.
· Skilled
and dedicated health workers.
· Ample
stocks of essential equipment and medicines.
· Patients
who know about the system and want to use it.
· And a
mechanism for collecting the data needed to improve quality.
I believe
the Nigerian primary health care system is not adequately funded. But it also
doesn’t get the most out of its current funding. I want to re-emphasize that
last point about data. More transparency would lead to more accountability,
which would strengthen governance, leadership, and management, which would
improve quality across the board.
I visited
a health clinic in Bodinga LGA in Sokoto yesterday, and it reminded me why I do
this work. I’d like to ask all of you to spend one hour at a health center in
the next month. I think you’ll see how the system can be improved—and how much
good it will do when it is.
I know
Nigeria can build up its primary care system, because I’ve seen what you
accomplish when you meet health challenges head on.
As many of
you know, we’ve been very close partners in your fight against polio. As you
can see on this graph, the hard work of hundreds of thousands of local leaders
and health workers since the turn of the millennium has paid off. Nigeria has
not had a case of wild polio virus in more than a year.
But the
graph also shows that you’ve reported zero cases before, only to learn that the
disease was still circulating in tiny pockets hidden by insecurity. It would be
catastrophic to let your guard down when you’re on the verge of eliminating the
disease once and for all.
I
believe—because I have seen your work in the field as recently as
yesterday—that you will do what it takes to end polio in Nigeria. We will be
here, working side by side with you, until you do.
Though
health is our foundation’s primary area of expertise, it’s not the only thing
we do, and it’s not the only thing I mean when I say Nigeria should invest in
its people. Healthy people need opportunities to thrive.
One of the
most important of these opportunities is agriculture, the sector that nourishes
Nigerians and supports half the population, especially the poorest.
The
agricultural sector is a pillar of the Nigerian economy. It accounts for a
large proportion of your GDP, and during the oil price collapse and recession,
it helped cushion the economy. But it still has a lot of potential to grow.
The
majority of Nigerian smallholder farmers lack access to the seeds, fertilizer,
and training they need to be more productive, and they lack access to the
markets they need to profit from their labor.
The
government has taken important steps to fill these gaps, with both more
investment and a series of smart policies to encourage private sector
investment. These reforms lay the foundation for a booming agricultural sector
that feeds the country, helps end chronic malnutrition, and lifts up tens of
millions of smallholder farmers. I urge you to build on this good work.
One of the
barriers that continues to prevent smallholders from thriving is their lack of
access to finance. Like good roads, finance connects farmers to opportunity,
yet only 4 percent of Nigerian farmers currently have a loan to grow their
business.
In a
country where three quarters of people have mobile phones, digital financial
services provide a solution to this problem. In fact, digital finance offers
the potential to boost the economy from top to bottom.
Right now,
more than 50 million Nigerian adults are at the whim of chance and the informal
economy. With access to digital financial tools, they can cope better with
disasters that threaten to wipe them out, build assets and a credit history,
and gradually lift themselves out of poverty.
Consider
the impact this would have on businesses. Of the 37 million micro, small, and
medium enterprises in Nigeria, more than 99 percent are micro. Their lack of
access to finance is a leading reason why these businesses can’t grow. With
digital payments, savings, and credit, they will finally have the resources to
plan for the future.
According
to the best estimates, digital financial services will create a 12.4 percent
increase in Nigeria’s GDP by 2025. Meanwhile, oil accounts for about 10 percent
of Nigeria’s GDP. Imagine adding another oil sector and then some to the
economy, but one whose benefits spread far and wide and reach almost every
single Nigerian.
There is
another benefit to digital financial services that will make everything I’m
urging you to do much easier: it will vastly improve the government’s ability
to tax and spend efficiently.
Let me
pause for a moment to say, I am confident that one thing you’ve been thinking
as I’ve been talking is that, while you would like to spend more on health and
nutrition and education and agriculture, you don’t have the money to do
everything. I appreciate the fact that what you can spend is a function of what
you raise.
Nigeria’s
government revenue as a percentage of its GDP is by far the lowest in the
world, at 6 percent. That makes investing in your people difficult. The next
lowest country, Bangladesh, collects 10 percent of its GDP. If you got yourself
up to second-to-last in the world, you would have an extra $18 billion to
budget. Obviously, you’re aiming higher than that, but it gives you some idea
about the scale we’re talking about.
We want to
support you in your work to mobilize more resources to invest in your country.
That’s why our foundation is working with the Nigeria Governors’ Forum to help
states track internally generated revenue.
Ultimately,
raising revenue to invest in growth will require delivering on the government’s
commitments to the Nigerian people, and convincing them that they will get a
return on their taxes.
Right now,
Nigeria’s fiscal situation is at what you might call a low equilibrium. In
return for low levels of service, people pay low levels of tax. We hope to help
you reach a higher equilibrium rooted in effective and transparent investments
in people. This equilibrium would trigger a virtuous cycle.
More
government revenue would lead to more money to spend on health and education.
Better health and education, and investment in sectors like agriculture, would
lead to more productive farms and factories. More productive farms would lead
to more prosperous farmers who could expand their farms or invest in other
businesses, especially if they had access to credit and other financial tools.
These thriving farms, factories, and new businesses would lead to more
government revenue. And the cycle would start again.
Triggering
that cycle will require bolder action—action you have the power to take as
leaders, governors, and ministers focused on Nigeria’s future.
Nigerians
are known around the world for their big dreams and big ambitions. Together with
the Dangote Foundation, we will be here to help you achieve your dreams and
ambitions. You have the support of the international community. The Nigerian
private sector will continue to invest. We are eager to help, but we know we
can’t lead. You must lead.
I believe
in the grand vision of Nigeria’s future. I believe in it because I’ve seen it.
It’s represented by this line—the line that depends on healthy, educated people
and the surge of economic activity they will unleash.
And that
means that the future depends on all of you—and your leadership in the years to
come. Thank you.
