Despite significant funds allocated each year to ease economic distress, a recent World Bank analysis suggests that Nigeria’s social safety-net programs are fundamentally ineffective.
The November 2025 assessment, titled “The State of Social Safety Nets in Nigeria,” exposed critical problems with coverage and operational efficiency.
The bank’s findings were stark: only 44 percent of the total funds distributed through government-backed welfare programs actually reach the nation’s impoverished citizens.
Poor Targeting and Structural Flaws
The report meticulously evaluated Nigeria’s financial outlay, the reach of its programs, and overall efficiency. It determined that weak funding, fragmented execution, and flawed targeting leave millions of vulnerable individuals without meaningful support. This situation undermines the government’s stated goals for poverty reduction.
Although 56 percent of the programs’ participants are classified as poor, this group only receives 44 percent of the total financial assistance.
The bank attributed this wide disparity to a structural flaw. Most programs, including the primary National Social Safety Nets Programme (NASSP), disburse a set amount per household, rather than basing the amount on the number of individuals.
Consequently, poorer families, which tend to be larger, must distribute the limited benefit among more members. This means a family of eight in a rural area may receive the exact same cash transfer as a three-person family in a semi-urban area, despite having much greater need.
The fixed transfer amount is diluted when shared among a larger number of people in poorer households, diminishing the intended effect.
Programs that target individuals are less susceptible to this flaw. However, the National Home-Grown School Feeding Programme (NHGSFP), which offers meals to primary school students, currently only benefits children in grades one through three. Its lack of full national coverage severely limits the number of children who can benefit from the scheme.
Negligible National Impact
Nigeria’s financial dedication to social protection is remarkably low. The nation spends barely 0.14 percent of its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) on social safety nets. This figure is considerably lower than the global average of 1.5 percent and the Sub-Saharan African average of 1.1 percent.
The bank warned that this minuscule investment has had “almost no impact” on reducing poverty nationally. The combined effect of all current social protection initiatives has moved the national poverty headcount by a mere 0.4 percentage points.
In essence, despite government claims of widespread intervention, the overall poverty level has barely budged. This poor outcome is blamed on insufficient benefit amounts and fundamentally flawed program design.
Success Model and Funding Risk
The report did recognize one exception. The NASSP cash transfer program, which uses the National Social Registry (NSR) to identify eligible poor households, shows demonstrably better results for its direct recipients.
Among those served, the program achieved a 4.3 percentage point reduction in poverty, making it nearly ten times more effective than all other combined initiatives. With over 85 million individuals now registered, the NSR represents the largest database of its kind in Sub-Saharan Africa.
The bank sees the NSR as an ideal platform for delivering more accurate and transparent social assistance.
However, the World Bank also highlighted a major risk: Nigeria’s heavy reliance on external funding for its welfare programs. From 2015 to 2021, official development aid supplied about 60 percent of the federal spending on these safety nets.
The World Bank itself contributed over 90 percent of that donor support. The report cautioned that this dependence creates vulnerability to funding gaps if international support declines. The bank stressed: “There is an urgent need for Nigeria to find fiscal space for sustainable social safety-net programming.”
