Falling Oil Price and Nigeria

The oil prices have been steadily going down in the last couple of years, prompting a
flurry of concern from the investors. This decline in oil price has come up as a result of
the increase in supply of oil, making the investors grow weary.
As U.S. crude CLc1 prices fell by $1.32 to $38.07 and Brent crude LCOc1 from $1.2 to
$39.07 per barrel, the investors were not happy. And with good reason, given how
several companies have gone bankrupt since oil price took a plunge, and over 250,000
workers lost their jobs in the process. A meeting has been scheduled in April for the
major global oil producers to discuss combating the fall in oil price by means of output
freeze. It remains to be seen how fruitful this meeting will be though.
In other news from Nigeria, President Muhammadu Buhari has urged the South
Sudanese government not to depend solely on revenues from oil, but try to explore
other channels of growing the countrys economy such as agriculture.
President Buhari made this statement while receiving the outgoing South Sudanese
ambassador to Nigeria in Abuja. He told the envoy that due to Nigerias heavy
dependency on oil in the last several years, its economy has been severely affected by
the ongoing fall in oil price. He advised that instead of depending on oil, they should
aim to achieve economic stability as well as job and food security by investing in
sustainable agriculture. Nigeria is currently reeling from the global oil price drop, and its
economic growth has slowed down from 6.3% in 2014 to just around 2.7% in 2015.
President Buhari blamed the opposition Peoples Democratic Party, saying that even
when the country was once selling crude at over $100 a barrel, there were no savings
by the previous government which is causing a lot of problems now.

 In response to President Buharisadvice, ambassador Riak

spoke highly of his four-year long stint as ambassador to
Nigeria as very fruitful. He also agreed that since South Sudan
was fortunate to have a lot of fertile land, any investment from
Nigerian companies in relation to agriculture will be welcome.
President Buhari is known to form fruitful relations with
internal as well as global leaders. As a result, he has been able
to develop good friendship with the United States, which has
become the largest foreign investor in Nigeria. Just a few weeks
ago, the United States Secretary of States, John Kerry,
announced that the U.S. will invest over $600 million this year
in Nigeria as a developmental fund which will be dedicated to
developing the countrys young leaders, fighting illiteracy and
diseases like HIV/AIDS. This fund will especially prove useful
since the country is still reeling from the effects of Boko
Harams insurgency and terrorism, which has caused a lot of
loss for the people of Nigeria, both economically and socially.