The World Bank has in a recent data it provided said that over 118 million Nigerian adults do not have bank accounts.
In a report released on Thursday at the ongoing Spring meetings of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank in Washington DC and made available in the latest Global Findex Database, the apex bank said only 40 percent of Nigerian adults have bank accounts.
It said Nigeria and six other countries are home to nearly half of the 1.7 billion people who do not have bank accounts.
"Globally, about 1.7 billion adults remain unbanked—without an account at a financial institution or through a mobile money provider. Indeed, nearly half live in just seven developing economies: Bangladesh, China, India, Indonesia, Mexico, Nigeria, and Pakistan," the report read."The gap between men and women in developing economies remains unchanged since 2011, at 9 percentage points."
Bear in mind that the National Population Commission (NPC) had pegged Nigeria's estimated population at 198 million, the seventh largest in the world.
TheCable further quoted the Bretton Wood institution as saying that most people in sub-Saharan African countries save for a business in contrast to adults in high-income economies who save for old age.
"Nearly half of adults in high-income economies reported saving for old age. In developing economies only 16 percent did. Saving for a business is more common in many Sub-Saharan African economies— reported by 29 percent or more of adults in Ethiopia, Kenya, and Nigeria, for example," the report read.
By: 360nobs
