62% Of Enterprises Use Mobile Banking

The National Bureau of Statistics has said, in its report titled ‘The impact of COVID-19 on business enterprises in Nigeria’, that 62 percent of enterprises use mobile banking for their business operations.

The report said, “While 90 percent of enterprises use phones in their daily operations, the level of adoption of other forms of technology is relatively low, particularly among those in the informal sector.

“Over half of the enterprises do not use the internet in their business operations while only 62 percent use mobile banking.”

The report said that only 40 per cent of enterprises use social media, 47 percent use the internet for their operation, and only 50 per cent own laptops.

The bureau added that 81 percent of enterprises were connected to the national grid for electricity.

It said that the North-Central (86 per cent) has a larger proportion of enterprises connected to the grid, followed by South-West (85 per cent) and North-East (72 per cent). The report said that a higher percentage of formal establishments, 86 per cent, were connected to the national grid compared to informal enterprises, 69 per cent.

The report said, “Around 88 per cent of all establishments incur monthly security expenditures such as compensation for security personnel and alarm systems.

“Among formal enterprises, this figure was higher at 91 percent while for informal enterprises it was 77 per cent.

“Overall, 39 per cent of all establishments spent between N10,000 and N50,000 per month while expenditures in the North-Central and South-West zones were relatively higher.

“A significant majority – 95 percent – of enterprises reported paying informal taxes with those in the South-East recording higher proportions compared to those in the North-West and South-West.

“Overall, 60 percent of the formal enterprises were paying more than N10,000/month while 69 per cent of informal enterprises were paying less than N10,000/ month.”

Meanwhile, tThe report detailed the ramifications of the COVID-19 pandemic and said disruption in operations of enterprises was evident across enterprises in all sectors with at least two thirds of businesses currently operating in the country having had to close down during the pandemic.

It said that a third of informal enterprises continued to operate throughout the pandemic adding that around one in 10 businesses were still closed.

The NBS said, “A drop in production, sales and revenues was commonly experienced by enterprises across the country, albeit to varying degrees. Median losses in revenue stood at 44 per cent relative to revenues in 2019.

“Meanwhile, the utilities and agriculture sectors emerged as relatively less impacted and some enterprises even reported gains compared to those in the transport and mining and quarrying sectors, for instance.

“Even after an eventual easing of the restrictions on movement and containment measures, the impact of the pandemic continued to linger with sales and revenues still contracting for 74 per cent of the enterprises.”

The NBS added that 43 per cent of the enterprises it sampled laid off around 20 percent of workers while 57 percent of businesses were able to maintain their staff strength during the pandemic.