Revisiting the nexus between remittances and financial sector development in Nigeria

Purpose ― The study aims to investigate the impact of remittances on financial sector development in Nigeria using data from 1990 to 2021. Method ― The study examines the variables' relationship using the Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) and Toda Yamamoto (TY) Causality. Findings ― The study finds that remittances have a positive and significant long-run impact on financial sector development. Total reserves and imports of goods and services have a negative and significant long-run impact. In the short run, remittances and deposit interest rates positively and significantly impact financial sector development, while total reserves and total population have negative and significant impacts. The Toda-Yamamoto causality result indicates a two-way causal relationship between financial sector development and remittances. Implication ― The study recommends that the government employs policies encouraging channeling remittances through a formal banking system, as well as ensuring that such remittances received are channeled to finance productive investment, hence financial development. Originality ― The novelty of this research relates to the use of the three main indicators of remittances in an economy, which are the import of goods and services, total reserves, and deposit interest rates, to examine its impact on financial sector development in Nigeri

Revisiting the nexus between remittances and financial sector development in Nigeria

Purpose ― The study aims to investigate the impact of remittances on financial sector development in Nigeria using data from 1990 to 2021. Method ― The study examines the variables' relationship using the Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) and Toda Yamamoto (TY) Causality. Findings ― The study finds that remittances have a positive and significant long-run impact on financial sector development. Total reserves and imports of goods and services have a negative and significant long-run impact. In the short run, remittances and deposit interest rates positively and significantly impact financial sector development, while total reserves and total population have negative and significant impacts. The Toda-Yamamoto causality result indicates a two-way causal relationship between financial sector development and remittances. Implication ― The study recommends that the government employs policies encouraging channeling remittances through a formal banking system, as well as ensuring that such remittances received are channeled to finance productive investment, hence financial development. Originality ― The novelty of this research relates to the use of the three main indicators of remittances in an economy, which are the import of goods and services, total reserves, and deposit interest rates, to examine its impact on financial sector development in Nigeri

Low coverage of COVID-19 vaccines in Africa:current evidence and the way forward

Disparities in COVID-19 vaccine coverage across the globe have uncovered inequities in global healthcare. While more than half of the population of the developed countries have been fully vaccinated, only a small percentage of the African population has received one vaccine dose so far, a far cry from the global vaccination targets. Furthermore, several low and middle income (LMICs) African countries lack the competence, infrastructure, logistics, and financial resources to mass-vaccinate their populations. This paper highlights the causes and implications of the low COVID-19 vaccine coverage on Africa and the global community, and discusses strategies for restructuring and strengthening COVID-19 vaccination in Africa

HausaNLP at SemEval-2023 Task 12: Leveraging African Low Resource TweetData for Sentiment Analysis

We present the findings of SemEval-2023 Task 12, a shared task on sentiment analysis for low-resource African languages using Twitter dataset. The task featured three subtasks; subtask A is monolingual sentiment classification with 12 tracks which are all monolingual languages, subtask B is multilingual sentiment classification using the tracks in subtask A and subtask C is a zero-shot sentiment classification. We present the results and findings of subtask A, subtask B and subtask C. We also release the code on github. Our goal is to leverage low-resource tweet data using pre-trained Afro-xlmr-large, AfriBERTa-Large, Bert-base-arabic-camelbert-da-sentiment (Arabic-camelbert), Multilingual-BERT (mBERT) and BERT models for sentiment analysis of 14 African languages. The datasets for these subtasks consists of a gold standard multi-class labeled Twitter datasets from these languages. Our results demonstrate that Afro-xlmr-large model performed better compared to the other models in most of the languages datasets. Similarly, Nigerian languages: Hausa, Igbo, and Yoruba achieved better performance compared to other languages and this can be attributed to the higher volume of data present in the languages

Revisiting the nexus between remittances and financial sector development in Nigeria

Purpose ― The study aims to investigate the impact of remittances on financial sector development in Nigeria using data from 1990 to 2021. Method ― The study examines the variables' relationship using the Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) and Toda Yamamoto (TY) Causality. Findings ― The study finds that remittances have a positive and significant long-run impact on financial sector development. Total reserves and imports of goods and services have a negative and significant long-run impact. In the short run, remittances and deposit interest rates positively and significantly impact financial sector development, while total reserves and total population have negative and significant impacts. The Toda-Yamamoto causality result indicates a two-way causal relationship between financial sector development and remittances. Implication ― The study recommends that the government employs policies encouraging channeling remittances through a formal banking system, as well as ensuring that such remittances received are channeled to finance productive investment, hence financial development. Originality ― The novelty of this research relates to the use of the three main indicators of remittances in an economy, which are the import of goods and services, total reserves, and deposit interest rates, to examine its impact on financial sector development in Nigeri

FINANCIAL DEVELOPMENT, REMITTANCES, AND TRADE OPENNESS NEXUS IN NIGERIA

The purpose of this study explores the impact of remittances on financial sector development in Nigeria data spanning from 1990 to 2021. The study used Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) and Toda Yamamoto (TY Causality) technique to examine the relationship between remittances and financial sector development. The result of the study indicates that remittances were found to have a positive significant impact on financial sector development during the period of the study real interest rate is also found to have a negative impact on financial sector development in Nigeria. Lastly, trade openness is found to have a positive statistically significant impact on financial sector development in Nigeria. The study recommends having established that remittances inhibit financial sector development, the government should employ policies that will encourage channeling remittances through a formal banking system. As well as ensuring that such remittances received are channeled to finance productive investment hence financial development. The novelty of this research lies in the fact that the study is against the few empirical studies that focused only on uncomplicated techniques in their analysis of data. Also, the study made use of the two main indicators of remittances in an economy, which are, trade openness, and real interest rate, to examine its impact on financial development in Nigeria

NEXUS BETWEEN INFRASTRUCTURE DEVELOPMENT AND MANUFACTURING SECTOR PERFORMANCE IN NIGERIA: THE MODERATING ROLE OF INSTITUTIONAL QUALITY

The role of infrastructure development in the manufacturing growth process is recognized in the literature and policy cycles, therefore, what determines it is also worthy of attention. This study investigates the relationship between infrastructural development and manufacturing sector performance in Nigeria: the moderating role of institutional quality. To accomplish this objective, the study employs an Autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) from (2002–2021). The results show that institutional quality in Nigeria has a negative impact on manufacturing sector performance both in the short run and long run. The study reveals that productive infrastructure development is positively and significantly improving manufacturing sector performance in Nigeria.  In general, institutional quality is introduced to improve the influence of infrastructural development on manufacturing sector performance. Furthermore, the study presents a perspective on the role of government in establishing an enabling environment that promotes infrastructural development. and, as a result, enhances manufacturing sector performance in Nigeria. Based on this finding, the study recommends the implementation of measures and policies aimed at encouraging productive infrastructural development that contributes to manufacturing sector performance in Nigeria. In addition, government and policymakers should improve the quality of institutions such as improving Government Effectiveness, Political Stability, Absence of Violence, Voice and Accountability, Regulatory Quality, Rule of Law, and Control of Corruption.&nbsp

Financial Development and Income Inequality in Nigeria: Testing the Financial Kuznets Curve Hypothesis

This study aims to investigate the link between financial development and income inequality in Nigeria, considering the potential existence of a financial Kuznets curve in Nigeria from 1986 to 2022. The study uses datasets from the World Bank and International Monetary Fund Database. It employs the Augmented Dickey-Fuller (ADF), Phillips-Perron (PP), Zivot-Andrews (ZA), ARDL bounds testing approach, and the Toda-Yamamoto causality test to determine the direction of causality between the two variables. The study finds evidence of an inverted U-shaped relationship between financial development and income inequality, potentially supporting the Financial Kuznets curve hypothesis in Nigeria. Additionally, the results of the Toda-Yamamoto causality test show a unidirectional causality running from financial development to income inequality. The findings have significant implications for economic development and social stability in Nigeria, emphasizing the need for targeted policies to mitigate the potential adverse effects of financial development on income inequality. This study fills a gap in existing research by examining the financial Kuznets curve in Nigeria and accounting for structural breaks, thus contributing valuable insights to the ongoing debate on finance and inequality

EXPLORING THE IMPACT OF FINANCIAL DEVELOPMENT ON AGRICULTURAL OUTPUT IN NIGERIA: THE MODERATING ROLE OF INSTITUTIONAL QUALITY

This study investigates the nexus between financial development, agricultural output, and institutional quality in Nigeria using annual time series data from 1990 to 2022. The Autoregressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) model and Toda-Yamamoto's (1995) non-causality approach are employed to assess the moderating influence of institutional quality on the relationship between financial development and agricultural output. The long-run findings reveal that financial development, institutional quality, and lending interest rates exert a positive and significant impact on agricultural output, while human development has a negative and significant impact. Conversely, the short-run results indicate that financial development and human development positively and significantly influence agricultural output, whereas lending interest rates negatively and significantly impact agricultural output. Based on these findings, the study recommends that policymakers enact measures to promote financial development, enhance institutional quality, and reduce interest rates to stimulate agricultural growth. Additionally, strengthening institutional quality is crucial to ensure that the benefits of financial development reach smallholder farmers, who play a pivotal role in Nigeria's agricultural sector. This study contributes to the literature by examining the moderating role of institutional quality in the relationship between financial development and agricultural output in Nigeria

Tuberculosis control in the face of emerging infectious diseases: Highlights from the 7th South African Tuberculosis Conference

Abstract Tuberculosis (TB) remains a disease of global concern caused by the pathogen Mycobacterium tuberculosis. In the face of emerging infectious diseases, such as COVID‐19, dengue fever, Lassa fever, and Ebola, attention to the control of TB is losing its place as a priority in public and global health initiatives. Recently, after a hiatus enforced by the COVID‐19 pandemic, scientists, public health experts, and other stakeholders met in Durban, South Africa (SA) for the 7th South Africa Tuberculosis Conference to share, discuss, and recommend strategies to regain TB control. In this paper, we summarized and captured key plenary sessions and presentations by scientists and other stakeholders at the conference, which focused on various themes: pathogenesis of TB—pathogen and host, drugs/vaccine/diagnostics, implementation/health systems, and social and community aspects of TB. The current policy and effort to control TB have declined in recent times. We suggested a critical and inclusive engagement of funders, researchers, policymakers, and the civil society toward regaining TB control. Additional investigation into this paper may make it easier to identify control strategies to help realize the End TB Strategy