IS HUMAN CAPITAL ACCUMULATION A GROWTH DRIVER IN NIGERIA? AN EMPIRICAL INVESTIGATION

Abstract

Accumulation of human capital is critical to sustained economic growth in the long run, since it facilitates the efficient absorption of new capital developments, improves the speed of adaptation of entrepreneurs and generates innovation necessary for sustained economic growth. It is against this premise this study investigate the human-capital accumulation growth-nexus in Nigeria. Employing a dynamic approach, involving test for unit roots, and cointegration, and finally, the Generalized Method of Moments (GMM) estimation techniques on annual time series data, covering the period 1981 to 2016, sourced from the World Bank Development Indicators (WDI) and Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) Statistical Bulletin, the empirical findings reveal that human and physical capital accumulation significantly induce rapid and sustained economic growth in the long-run. The other variables- infrastructural development (measured by ICT infrastructure) and industrial output (a measure of industrialization) have positive but weak impacts on economic growth, on account of the weak infrastructural development, and low level of industrialization in Nigeria. Inflation rate (a measure of macroeconomic policy environment) on the other hand, is found to have a militating effect on economic growth. We recommend amongst others; sustained investments in human and physical capital accumulation, stable and coherent macroeconomic policies, particularly with respect to taming of domestic inflationary pressures, supportive institutional structures and aggressive industrialization-enhancing policies, in order to enhance sustained economic growth in Nigeria.