The Socio-Economic Impact of Covid-19 on The Economic Activities of Selected States in Nigeria

Abstract

COVID-19 pandemic which has spread to 35 states in Nigeria as a health crisis has translated to economic crisis affecting all sector of the Nigeria economy and brought the whole states to its knees. The fundamental question that comes to mind is; in what way did a health crisis translate to an economic crisis? How /why COVID-19 crippled many states economy in Nigeria? The answer lies in the  methods in which COVID-19 has silenced economic activities ranging from the spread of the virus which translated to lockdown policy, band on interstate travel, restriction on movement, shutting down of worship centers, social distancing which led to the shutdown of businesses, trade, shutting down of the hospitality industries, commercial banks and events. We focused on the period from the start of March 2020 when the coronavirus began spreading into other states of the federation through May 4^th, 2020 when the Federal government relaxed the lockdown policy. Our objective was to examine the socio-economic effect of the lockdown policy on business, transport and service/hospitality industries in three selected metropolis from three states within the period of relaxation. Using the multistage sampling method, we selected 300 respondents across the three sector examined. Data obtained via structured questionnaires was analysed using inferential statistics. This includes Multiple Regression Analysis, Coefficient for correlations of independent sample and analysis of variance (ANOVA) for significant impact samples. The findings reveal that the increasing number of lockdown days, interstate travel ban, social distancing, and restriction to essentials services severely affected the level of economic activities within the period under review. In contrast, CPL PSL RSM had negative relationship but significant impact in the model, while BSK and ITR negative non-significant impact in the models due to imposed restriction on internal movement, while the rest variables had positive significant effect on the level of economic activities.