Nigeria economy expands as oil output grows

Nigeria’s economy, the largest in Africa, expanded at a slightly faster pace in the third quarter as oil production increased, latest data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) showed.

Barrel of oil

The nation Gross Domestic Product (GDP) rose 2.8 percent from a year ago, compared with 2.4 percent in the second quarter and 6.2 percent in the same period of 2014, the NBS data showed. It said oil output jumped to 2.17 million barrels a day from 2.05 million barrels.
Nigeria, Africa’s biggest oil producer, is struggling to cope with an almost 60 percent plunge in crude prices since June last year. Economic growth is set to slow to 3.9 percent this year from 6.3 percent in 2014, according to the median estimate of 10 economists surveyed by Bloomberg.
The oil industry rose 1.1 percent in the three months to the end of September, after contracting 6.8 percent in the previous quarter, the statistics agency said. The non-oil industry, which makes up 90 percent of GDP, increased 3.1 percent in the third quarter, down from 7.5 percent a year earlier. Manufacturing fell 1.8 percent, the third consecutive quarterly contraction.