Agricultural Sector Financing and Economic Growth in Nigeria: 1988 to 2023

This study investigated the impact of agricultural sector financing on economic growth in Nigeria from 1988 to 2023. The objective of the study is the examine the impact of agricultural financing indicators including government expenditure on agriculture, agriculture credit guarantee scheme fund, commercial bank loan to agriculture on economic growth in Nigerian. Data used for the study were collected from Central Bank of Nigeria.

The study adopted descriptive statistics, unit root test, co-integration, error correction model to estimate and analyse the study variables. Also post diagnostic tests including normality test, auto correction test, and Heteroscedasticity test were conducted to determine if result from the data agree with the assumptions of Ordinary Least Square (OLS) technique.

The major finding reveals that government expenditure on agriculture, agriculture credit guarantee scheme fund have positive and insignificant impact on economic growth, while Commercial loan to agriculture has negative and insignificant impact on economic growth in Nigeria within the reviewed period. Based on the result, the study recommends that government should intensify policies and programs that would enable farmers to have easy access to agricultural loan and such law should compel them to use the fund for the purpose meant for.