financing is increasing but remains small (on average $2 million per year), and bilateral donors in Nigeria prioritize the humanitarian response and stabilization of conflict‑affected areas in the north‑east. This explains the large size of the UNDP peacebuilding and conflict prevention portfolio. Nigeria is considered a large economy with the capacity to fund its own national development plan, and UNDP interventions require contributions from the Government (national and subnational), but there are often shortfalls. Even before COVID‑19, Nigeria’s dependence on petroleum and crude oil made it vulnerable to fluctuating oil prices, which affect the fiscal space for development. Furthermore, with reductions in official development assistance and foreign direct investment flows, the Nigerian Government has had to finance development projects, including the pandemic response, through public debt, with implications for national economic health (public debt was 20 percent of GDP before COVID‑19). In this scenario, the potential to leverage government financing is low. The loss of core resources for UNDP Nigeria is significant and affects its positioning, since these funds have a catalytic effect, enabling the country office to initiate new programmes, bridge funding gaps and leverage additional resources. The 2020 IEO‑led Evaluation of UNDP Development Cooperation in Middle‑income Countries found that the income‑based country classification to determine resource allocations had limited the ability of UNDP to respond to the complex development challenges faced by middle‑income countries, which are often the same as for low‑income countries. The middle‑income country classification may not be the most suited for a country like Nigeria, where only about five out of 36 States can be considered to have middle‑income status. The evaluation did not include in its scope the assessment of UNDP staffing capacities.
FIGURE 4. Evolution of country programme budget and expenditure, 2014‑2021 million US$
Budget
Expenditure
Execution rate 100%
70
90%
60
60.11
50
70% 42.2
40
39.8
45.6
45.7
40.6
39.7 36.5
30 24.0
20
19.3
25.6 22.3
33.0
60% 50%
33.7
40% 25.8
24.2
30% 20%
10 0
80%
10% 2014
2015
2016
2017
2018
2019
2020
2021
0
Source: UNDP Corporate Planning System (Atlas). As of 19 January 2022. Does not include COVID‑19 response budget
Chapter 2. Findings
37
