Nigeria Suffers $7bn Economic Damage, Loses 600 Lives To Floods In 2022 – FG

By Akeem Oduyoye

The Federal Government has disclosed that the country’s infrastructural damage from the flood in 2022 stood at about $7 billion, just as it also claimed 600 lives

The Vice President, Kashim Shettima, disclosure at a UN Framework Convention on Climate Change in Abuja on Tuesday.

Shettima, who was represented by Deputy Chief of Staff Ibrahim Hassan, added that Nigeria is negatively impacted by climate change, one of humanity’s biggest challenges.

“We are all living witnesses to the ravaging floods of last year (2022), which held the country to a standstill for days. The World Bank’s Global Rapid post-disaster damage estimation assessment put the total direct economic damage to infrastructure at about $7bn,” he said.

Nigeria is experiencing the worst flooding in at least a decade. The floods have damaged homes, infrastructure and large areas of farmland across the country. More than 600 people have died and an estimated 2.8 million people have been affected, many of whom have been displaced from their communities. 

More than 2,400 persons. About 82,035 houses had been damaged, and 332,327 hectares of land had also been affected.

While Nigeria typically experiences seasonal flooding, this flood was the worst in the country since the 2012 floods^.

As at October last year, over 200,000 homes were completely or partially destroyed by the floods. On the 7th of October, a boat carrying people fleeing the floods capsized on the Niger River, causing 76 deaths.

The flooding was caused by heavy rainfall and climate change as well as the release of water from the Lagdo Dam in neighbouring Cameroon,which began on the 13th of September. Flooding, which affected Nigeria, Niger, Chad, and the surrounding region, began in the early summer of 2022 and ended in October.