Nigeria

Nigeria sees record inflation in March

Business /

Nigeria’s headline inflation rate rose 1.50% to 33.20% in March, the country’s statistics bureau reported on Monday. The figure is the highest in 28 years. The National Bureau of Statistics attributed the increase to soaring food and energy costs.  Consumer inflation in Africa’s most populous country has been on an upward trend for 15 straight months, eating into people’s incomes and draining savings. It was at 31.70% in February. The agency reported that food inflation stood at 40.01% in March 2024. It was at 37.92% in February. The removal of a fuel subsidy by new President Bola Tinubu last June has seen prices skyrocket in Nigeria, leaving millions of people struggling to meet basic needs. Nigeria has also devalued its currency – the Naira twice in under a year in a bid to ease chronic shortages of forex, making the dollar appreciate remarkably against the Naira. This year alone, Nigeria’s central bank has twice raised interest rates in a bid to calm down inflation. The bank said it expected prices to begin dropping in May.

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Deadly heat in West Africa warns of climate change

Africa /

In late March and early April, days and nights of extreme heat above 40° Celsius (104°F) gripped many West African countries. Temperatures soared so high in Mali and Burkina Faso they equated to a once in 200-year event, according to the report on the Sahel region by World Weather Attribution (WWA) The severity of the heatwave led WWA’s team of climate scientists to conduct a rapid analysis, which concluded the temperatures would not have been reached if industry had not warmed the planet by burning fossil fuels and other activities. Despite a lack of data, WWA estimates there were hundreds or possibly thousands of heat-related deaths, and it warned such extreme heat will become much more common without greater global efforts to reduce planet-warming emissions. Given the growing threat, the group recommends that countries formulate heat action plans that would warn citizens when extreme temperatures are imminent and offer guidance on how to prevent overheating.

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