Inside the 2025 Nextier Development Festival

Shades of Us at the Health, Nutrition, and Well-being Session at the 2025 Nextier Development Festival

By Shades of Us

On September 23, 2025, Shades of Us attended the inaugural Nextier Development Festival, a gathering in Abuja that brought together 200 scholars, policymakers, development consultants, civil society leaders, entrepreneurs, and youth voices to confront one of Africa’s most urgent and enduring challenges: poverty.

The festival aimed to shift the narrative around development by grounding conversations in evidence and experience. Organisers committed to sharing the insights generated through a new development-focused periodical and policy paper that governments can work with as we collectively work to end poverty in Africa. With poverty rising across the continent, despite global declines, the focus could not be more timely. While China has lifted 800 million people out of poverty, over 429 million Africans continue to live on less than $2.15 per day. The gap between sub-Saharan Africa and the rest of the world is growing wider.

Participants were selected to explore root causes, evaluate past interventions, and propose strategies to strengthen systems and reshape outcomes. The festival’s core objectives included evaluating what has worked, identifying what has failed, understanding why, and building new alliances to support long-term solutions.

Addressing Poverty in Nigeria

This panel explored the country’s historical, present, and future approach to poverty alleviation, with a strong focus on policy coherence, data use, and systemic reform.

Shamsudeen Lawal (Nigeria Bureau of Statistics) noted the importance of data-driven analysis: “Even though we have a level of independence, we are still a government agency. We try to engage specific stakeholders to understand the underlying causes of multidimensional poverty.” He emphasized that beyond numbers, data must drive strategy and collaboration.

Prof. Chidiebere Onyia (Secretary to the Enugu State Government) provided insight from a state-level perspective: “We used data to site our smart schools. When we found capacity gaps in the Enugu State Bureau of Statistics, we hired the best hands. We have allocated 33% of the state budget to education. And we are pushing legislation to make sure our smart schools outlive political cycles.” He pointed out that tracking the informal sector remains a challenge, but the state is taking steps to mitigate this. He explained that the Enugu State Government identified the pillars of economic transformation and made institutional reforms to reflect this understanding. “The governor holds regular town hall meetings to keep the people involved,” he added. “Our development indices focus on women—not as tokenism—but because women, when given opportunity, outperform expectations. But what the private sector will never hedge is insecurity, so we’re using smart CCTV and mapping crime hotspots across the state.”

We loved the idea of the Enugu state government legislating reforms for the smart schools project to ensure their sustainability. It was refreshing to see that the state was using its resources to build the capacities of its citizens on artificial intelligence, software and hardware development, and programming for an IT-progressivel Enugu State, and Nigeria as a whole.

Jakob Dirksen (Research and Policy Officer, Oxford Poverty and Human Development Initiative) reflected on structural barriers to progress: “The most important thing is that we need to realize how important data is. The key thing that has prevented progress from happening is political struggles.” His remarks pointed to the need for depoliticized, long-term planning frameworks.

Patrick O. Okigbo III, the founder of Nextier and moderator for this session, challenged the audience to consider the depth of Nigeria’s poverty challenge. “Many critics say that Nigeria’s poverty alleviation programs tend to focus on the symptoms rather than the root causes,” he said. “Some of the things we need to do to address poverty at the root cause level take years.” The session underlined the tension between long-term structural reform and short-term political cycles.

Health, Nutrition, and Well-being: Understanding Poverty’s Dimensions

This breakout session examined the direct links between poverty and poor health outcomes. It sought to build a shared understanding of how poverty limits access to healthcare, and how health systems can become tools for resilience.

Dr. Nnennaya Kalu-Umeh opened with a sobering assessment of the current landscape. “We have a large population and a high dependency ratio. We are grappling with infectious and non-communicable diseases. Our suboptimal health indices are higher than usual: maternal mortality, under-five mortality, and more. Poverty makes people more likely to modify their health-seeking behavior to what they can afford.” She explained that poverty and health are deeply intertwined, with households often making trade-offs between food and healthcare. “A household is said to be deprived if there is a child under five who is malnourished. Between 2023 and 2024, over 100 million Nigerians faced food insecurity. Every Nigerian is one catastrophic illness away from poverty,” she warned. She advocated for a preventive model of care: “We need African solutions to African problems.”

We loved the idea of African solutions to African problems. However, some solutions to poverty alleviation are global and centered on our humanity. We can have a mix of solutions to guide our drive out of multidimensional poverty. 

Dr. Ifunanya Ilodibe (CEO, EHA Clinics) brought the conversation closer to communities. “Healthcare is always happening. It may not always happen in hospitals. Healthcare is a game of trust. We need to bring healthcare into communities, at least within five kilometers of every resident.” She pointed to the role of trusted providers like patent and proprietary medicine vendors (PPMVs) and emphasized their potential in triaging patients and linking them to care early. “Financial healthcare is not just an equity issue; it is a workforce problem,” she added. She raised questions around digital tools, asking, “Are AI or digital tools easier to use for healthcare? We have to remember that the patient has a journey with the healthcare platform.”

Dr. Simeon Onyekachi focused on the policy landscape. “We have some idea funds that could be doing a lot for the health space. Can Nigeria allocate a fraction of the conditional cash transfers to enrolling people on the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS)?” He suggested that improving healthcare supply would automatically boost insurance uptake. “If we do the needful with the supply side of healthcare, more people will take up health insurance. Health insurance can take care of health promotion, prevention, and curation.” He closed with a call for national vision: “It is important that citizens know where we are going.”

Dr. Jemchang Fabong, who leads Health Practice at Nextier and is also Chief Executive of Frontier Clinics and served as a moderator for this session, offered data that underscored the urgency. “Over 70% of healthcare expenditures are out-of-pocket. We have just four doctors and sixteen nurses per 100,000 people in Nigeria. Government accountability has been a huge challenge.”

Ramatu Ada Ochekliye, our Founder, contributed a thoughtful perspective to the discussion. She acknowledged the importance of designing solutions based on what people say they want, but cautioned against limiting innovation to existing perceptions. “There are solutions to problems that people do not yet know they need,” she said, reflecting on her own journey with health insurance. She shared that she initially saw no need for it until she was encouraged to try it. When it proved useful during a medical emergency, she became a strong advocate for universal health insurance. She added that many healthcare advancements remain outside the awareness or imagination of the average person. “If we design solutions only based on what people know—which often shapes what they think they want—we risk shortchanging them in the long run.” Her remarks highlighted the need to balance community-driven design with visionary policy that anticipates future needs.

Social Protection and Resilience Building

This session explored social safety nets and their potential to reduce vulnerability and support long-term resilience.

Engr. Umar B. Bindir, Founder and Chief Operating Officer of Bindir Knowledge Centre and former National Coordinator of the Nigeria Social Investment Programme, offered a frank critique of the system. “Most of our social safety nets are not built for longevity. Single interventions do not create long-term resilience. When designing an effective social safety program, context matters. There is no one-size-fits-all.” He raised eyebrows with a provocative comment: “Nigerians actually like their poverty.” He clarified that this was not about enjoying hardship, but about societal adaptation. “All the policies around industrialization, education, health, and agriculture are poverty alleviation policies. But unless we respect institutions, we cannot end poverty. Everything we need to do to alleviate poverty must be cultural. Mothers dying during childbirth should be unacceptable.”

Ramatu Ada Ochekliye asked a key question that shifted the tone of the conversation: how can storytelling bring people on board for social safety programs? She admitted that she had grown jaded about government-led social protection initiatives, shaped by years of disillusionment and unmet promises. However, the stories shared by Engr. Bindir—stories of success, challenge, and institutional growth—began to shift her perspective. “Of course, I will verify their validity,” she said, “but these stories have sparked a desire in me to explore other vantage points in the conversation.” Her question underscored a critical insight: while sound policy is essential, it must be paired with compelling, authentic communication. Without stories that resonate and connect, even the most effective programs risk being misunderstood or ignored.

In wrapping up the session, Patrick O. Okigbo III emphasized belief and persistence. “We need to have confidence that we can end poverty. We can make mistakes and figure it out,” he said. “We cannot tax poverty,” he added, drawing nods from across the room.

Closing Reflections

The 2025 Nextier Development Festival provided a space for confronting the complexity of poverty, where policy ideas were examined alongside lived experiences, and data was used to deepen understanding rather than merely illustrate trends.

From multisectoral collaboration to cultural change, healthcare reform to social protection, the message was clear: ending poverty in Africa is possible, but only if we confront it at its roots, build inclusive systems, and keep the people at the centre of the process.

As Shades of Us continues to advocate for inclusive development, we left the festival inspired but acutely aware of the magnitude of the challenges ahead. One of the core focuses of our work remains Goal 1 of the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals: No Poverty. We understand the indignity and constraints that poverty imposes on individuals, and we recognize that no nation can achieve true sustainability or contribute meaningfully to global development without effectively addressing poverty.

Let us keep pushing. Let us continue to ask the hard questions. Let us keep building.