WORLD BANK: Only 44% Of Government Social Benefits Reach Poor Nigerians Despite Billions Spent On Safety Net Programs

 

Nigeria’s social safety-net programs are failing to reach the country’s most vulnerable citizens, despite billions of naira being spent annually on poverty alleviation, according to a new World Bank report. The November 2025 report, titled The State of Social Safety Nets in Nigeria, reveals that only 44 percent of benefits from government-funded safety-net initiatives actually reach the poor, highlighting inefficiencies in program design and implementation.

The World Bank report examines the coverage, funding, and effectiveness of Nigeria’s social protection programs and shows how poor targeting, weak allocations, and fragmented execution leave millions of citizens without meaningful support. Although about 56 percent of the recipients of social safety-net programs are classified as poor, they receive less than half of the total benefits, the report explains.

A key factor contributing to this imbalance is the way most programs, including the National Social Safety Nets Programme, allocate a fixed amount per household rather than per person. Poor households, often larger in size, end up spreading limited resources among more members, diluting the intended impact. Programs targeting individuals, such as the National Home-Grown School Feeding Programme, avoid this issue but are limited in scope, currently serving only pupils in grades one to three, which restricts the number of children who can benefit.

Federal government officials have stressed the importance of expanding support to vulnerable populations. Finance Minister Wale Edun recently stated that the digital cash-grant scheme aims to cover 15 million households, equivalent to around 70 million people, with 8.5 million households already receiving at least one N25,000 payment. The remaining 6.5 million households are expected to receive their payments before the end of the year.

Despite these efforts, the World Bank describes Nigeria’s social safety-net spending as largely inefficient. Nigeria currently dedicates only 0.14 percent of its Gross Domestic Product to social protection, far below the global average of 1.5 percent and the Sub-Saharan African average of 1.1 percent. This minimal allocation, combined with poor targeting, has had almost no measurable impact on reducing poverty, with the total effect of existing programs lowering the national poverty headcount by just 0.4 percentage points.

The report highlights the reliance on foreign funding as a significant vulnerability for Nigeria’s social safety nets. Between 2015 and 2021, official development assistance contributed around 60 percent of federal spending on these programs, with the World Bank providing over 90 percent of that external support. The heavy reliance on donor funding risks creating funding gaps if external support declines.

Poor program design also undermines the impact of interventions. Cash transfers distributed per household fail to account for family size differences. For instance, a rural family of eight and an urban household of three may receive the same benefit, although the larger family faces deeper hardship. This flaw limits the ability of programs to lift families out of poverty or reduce inequality.

Programs with better targeting have shown more promising results. The National Social Safety Nets Programme, which uses the National Social Registry to identify and reach poor households, has demonstrated significant success. Among its beneficiaries, poverty declined by 4.3 percentage points, and the poverty gap fell by 4.2 percentage points, nearly ten times more effective than the combined impact of other social safety-net initiatives. With over 85 million individuals captured in the registry, the platform provides an opportunity for more accurate and transparent social assistance delivery.

The World Bank emphasized that scaling up well-targeted programs could produce far greater poverty reduction effects. The report calls for Nigeria to prioritize sustainable funding, improve targeting, and design programs that consider household size to ensure that social benefits genuinely reach those who need them most.