Human Capital Development and Poverty Alleviation in Nigeria: Evidence from ARDL Model

Theoretical and empirical research has emphasized that education is the most powerful instrument fordeveloping and empowering citizens to master their social, cultural environment and compete forsurvival. However, most of the developing economies, although conscious of the transformation, thateducation brings, are yet to reap its full potential. A recent statistic on the multidimensional povertyindex in Nigeria coordinated by the National Bureau of Statistics (2022) indicates that 63% of personsliving in Nigeria (133 million people) are multidimensionally poor. Furthermore, the incidence ofmonetary poverty is lower than the incidence of multidimensional poverty across most states. The2018/19 national monetary poverty line indicates that 40.1% of people are poor. Over time, differentgovernments in Nigeria have adopted programmes and policies to address the challenge of poverty inNigeria, some of which are based on the empowerment of youths and women, among others. Also,education at the primary level in most states in Nigeria is financed by the government. This studyascertains whether human capital development can alleviate the poverty level of Nigerians using datathat spans from 1985-2020. The autoregressive distributed lag model was employed. It was found that along-run relationship exists between human capital development and poverty in Nigeria. In the shortrun, government spending on health, consumer price index, final consumption expenditure andemployed persons determine poverty headcount in Nigeria. Even though findings indicate significantrelationships between key variables, the study recommends the urgent need to ensure that economicgrowth is inclusive and sustainable in Nigeria. This can be enhanced through increased public andprivate sector investment in education and health.