HOW IT CAN BOOST THE ECONOMY OF NIGERIA AND THE WORLD AT

LARGE
By Oni Damilola

Advances in information technology reinforce the economic and social changes

that are transforming business and society. A new kind of economy the
information economy is emerging where trade and investment are global and
firms compete with knowledge, networking and agility on a global basis. A
corresponding new society is also emerging with pervasive information
capabilities that make it substantially different from an industrial society: more
competitive, more democratic, less centralized, less stable, better able to
address individual needs, and friendlier to the environment. These changes
dictate, for all countries, a major adjustment to harness information for economic
and social development. This adjustment requires urgent new policies, regulatory
and institutional reforms, and investments. Through this adjustment, countries
must achieve macro-economics balance, political stability, and growth amidst
global information flows, competition, trade and investment. Advanced countries
are rapidly adjusting. Nigeria must also adjust or risk exclusion from the global
economy and severe competitive disadvantage for their goods and services.
Fortunately, the information revolution creates both the challenge and the means
for countries to adjust to new ways of doing business and to put in place the
needed infrastructure of telecommunication and information systems. The
information revolution also creates extraordinary new opportunities to attack
vexing problems of poverty, inequality, and environmental degradation.
An avenue through which information technology has the potential to increase
labour productivity is through its use. The rhetoric of the New Economy
proponents often focuses on the efficiencies that will accrue to firms engaged in
activities other than the production of IT but which nevertheless successfully
integrate the use of IT into their existing operations. Firms that use IT could
expect productivity gains for two reasons. First, the rapid decline in the price of
computing power has spurred huge investments in IT. This investment, like any
other form of capital spending, should raise the productive capacity of those

firms that undertake it. Second, IT has the potential to allow firms to implement
efficiency-enhancing changes in the way they do business.
All seven regions of the world economy experienced a surge in investment in IT
equipment and software after 1995. The impact of IT investment on economic
growth has been most striking in the G7 economies. The rush in IT investment
was especially conspicuous in the U.S., but jumps in the contribution of IT
capital input in Canada, Japan, and the U.K. were only slightly lower. Following
the G7, the next most important increase was in Developing Asia, led by China.
The Non-G7 industrialized economies followed Developing Asia. The role of IT
investment more than doubled after 1995 in Latin America, Eastern Europe, and
North Africa, the Middle East, and Sub-Saharan Africa.
Nigeria has not been left out in the IT surge has many advancements have been
made in the last 5 years. Perhaps the most popular technology in the last 5
years has been the advent of G.S.M technology which has had far reaching
implications on the economy .The advent of G.S.M has helped
telecommunications tremendously which in turn has had a ripple effect on the
economy most especially boosting the general use of the Internet and Internet
related services
Improvement in information technology has also facilitated more transactions in
the economy. In the past 3-5 years tremendous advances have been made that
made payments on the internet and other channels such as ATMs, self service
kiosks, POS terminals and other generally accepted channels
Despite all these however there are still some inherent gaps in the application of
information technology in the economy. If some of these gaps can be rightly
addressed the Nigeria will be the leading ICT solution provider within the next
decade.