Kashim Shettima, Nigeria’s vice president, travelled to Rome, Italy, on Monday to attend the ongoing United Nations Food Systems Summit.
Shettima shared a part of his address, titled “Scaling up of multi-stakeholder collaboration and investments in the implementation of the food systems pathways in Nigeria,” at the summit on Wednesday.
FIJ found some of the claims in Shettima’s speech incorrect and unreliable.
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While trying to convince international counterparts of Nigeria’s obvious potential as a major market, Shettima claimed that Nigeria would become the world’s third most populous nation.
“Nigeria will surpass the United States as the third most populous nation on earth, and the population is young. The median age is 19,” he said.
Both claims are unreliable and inaccurate. Nigeria’s median age has not been marked at 19 years, and the country has not conducted a successful population census to determine its actual population.
“The United States will remain the world’s third-most populous country in 2030,” the World Economic Forum stated in August 2022.
“In fact, there’s little change in the top 10 over the next 8 years. China and India swap places and Ethiopia leapfrogs Japan, Mexico and Russia to go from 12th in 2022 to 9th by 2030.”
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Other international organisations and survey companies unanimously project that the US will stay the world’s third most populated country in the next decade. The United Nations holds that there will be little changes in the top ten most populated nations by 2030.
Population Pyramid, a project dedicated to monitoring population variables between 1950 and 2100, also maintained that Nigeria would remain the world’s sixth most populated country by 2030.
Statista stated that the median age of the Nigerian population was 16.9 years in 2020.
According to Worldometer’s July 2023 estimate, Nigeria’s median age is 17.2 years. “Nigeria’s median age is 17.0 against a global value of 30.3 years,” according to World Economies’ latest estimates.
The post VP Shettima States Incorrect Statistics as Facts at UN Food Summit in Italy appeared first on Foundation For Investigative Journalism.