ABUJA, May 31 (Xinhua) -- Nigeria's information and communications technology (ICT) sector has contributed 14.07 percent to the country's Gross Domestic Product (GDP), said the Minister of Communications and Digital Economy Isa Patanmi on Sunday.
This is an unprecedented record by the ICT sector in the country, Patanmi said in a statement made available to Xinhua.
He said the ICT sector contributed that percentage to the Nigerian GDP in the first quarter (Q1) of this year, citing recent data by the Nigerian Bureau of Statistics.
"It is noteworthy that the ICT sector contributed 14.07 percent to the total real GDP in Q1 2020, higher than its contribution a year earlier, which was 13.32 percent, and in the preceding quarter, which it accounted for 13.12 percent," the minister said.
He attributed the growth of the ICT sector and its contribution to the GDP as a "direct result of the focused and committed effort of the Nigerian federal government".
Patanmi said the COVID-19 pandemic had shown how critical the ICT sector was to the growth of the country's digital economy and by extension, the general economy. Enditem
