…lauds NBS, development partners on quality of report
The Minister of Finance, Budget and National Planning, Mrs. (Dr.) Zainab Ahmed has described the Nigerian 2021 Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey and the National Immunization Cluster Survey (MICS/NICS) report as vital to the nation’s socio-economic development, especially as its relates to policy measures to address children and women health and education challenges.
The minister, who made this remark on Tuesday during the formal launch of the report in Abuja, explained that the MICS report 2021 represented the 6th round in Nigeria and would serve as a major source of data for assessing Nigeria’s progress on the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals.
Ahmed, while commending the Statistician General of the Federation and Chief Executive Officer of the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), Prince Adeyemi Adeniran, the NBS directorate and management staff and the development partners for their commitment to the production of the report, amid great odds, promised that the findings of the report would be used at national and subnational levels to improve socio-economic wellbeing of Nigerian women, children and other citizens in the years ahead.
The minister said: “The report focuses on child health and nutrition which is in line with the national education policy and multi-sector plan and actions for food and nutrition in Nigeria. Data users and researchers working on socio-economic development areas would find data in this report useful because the MICS and NICs reports are sponsored to the basics of all relevant survey stakeholders in the development stages.
“Permit me to say that over the years, the MICS have focused on various socio-economic issues bothering on health, education, child protection and other topics that directly affect the lives of children and women.
“Therefore, this report will continue to serve as a major source of credible data for Nigeria in establishing the base line for measuring progress on the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) focusing on key relevant indicators across several sectors”, Ahmed added.
Earlier in his opening remarks, the Statistician General of the Federation explained that the 6th round MICS of the survey was the first round to be conducted since the advent of the Covid-19 pandemic and that the findings would shed some light on how the pandemic affected househols nationwide.
He said: “This round of survey which has over 200 indicators, recorded the highest response rate in the MICS series, recording an impressive response rate of 99 percent. It also had some notable improvements to it, making it the most comprehensive MICS survey ever to be conducted in Nigeria.”
Prince Adeyemi expressed optimism that the launch of the MICS/NICS report’s results and subsequent deliberations on the results would lead to the review, design and implementation of policies and programmes that positively impact on the lives of Nigerians, more particularly, on the lives of women and children.
