The World Bank has approved three new projects totaling $1.57 billion to assist Nigeria’s Federal Government in enhancing human capital through improved healthcare for women, children, and adolescents, as well as increasing resilience to climate change impacts like floods and droughts by improving dam safety and irrigation.
The funding includes $500 million for addressing governance challenges in education and healthcare (HOPE-GOV), $570 million for the Primary Healthcare Provision Strengthening Program (HOPE-PHC), and $500 million for the Sustainable Power and Irrigation for Nigeria Project (SPIN).
The HOPE-GOV and HOPE-PHC programs are designed to improve basic education and primary healthcare service delivery, which are crucial for advancing Nigeria’s human capital.
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The SPIN project will focus on enhancing dam safety, water resource management for hydropower, and irrigation in select regions.
The HOPE-GOV Program will tackle governance weaknesses in the financial and human resource management systems of Nigeria’s education and healthcare sectors.
It aims to increase the effectiveness of funding, improve transparency, and boost the recruitment, deployment, and performance management of teachers and healthcare workers at federal, state, and local levels.
In line with the Federal Government’s new health sector reforms under the Health Sector Renewal Investment Initiative, the HOPE-PHC project will work to reduce maternal and child mortality rates and strengthen the healthcare system’s resilience, benefiting 40 million people, particularly vulnerable populations.
The program is supported by a $500 million concessional loan from the International Development Association (IDA) and an additional $70 million grant from the Global Financing Facility for Women, Children, and Adolescents (GFF).
The SPIN Program aims to protect citizens from climate-related hazards by enhancing dam safety and improving irrigation and drainage services across 40,000 hectares, benefiting up to 950,000 people, including households, farmers, and livestock breeders. It will also support a master plan for hydropower and develop public-private partnerships for hydropower projects.
These initiatives reflect the World Bank’s commitment to supporting Nigeria in addressing critical governance, healthcare, and climate resilience challenges.
“Effective investment in the health and education of Nigerians today is central to increasing their future employment opportunities, productivity, and earnings, while reducing poverty of the most vulnerable. This new financing for human capital and primary healthcare will help to address the complex difficulties faced by Nigerians especially women and girls around access and quality of services, but also the governance arrangements that also explain these difficulties” said Dr. Ndiamé Diop, the World Bank Country Director for Nigeria.
“The SPIN program is timely and will protect Nigerians from floods and droughts in the areas where it will be implemented, while enabling an increase in hydropower generation. The direct positive impact of this project on people and livelihoods is enormous, The World Bank is pleased to work with the government and other stakeholders to deliver this program,” Diop added.
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