Measuring the Impact of Human Resource Development on Poverty Incidence in Nigeria: A Bound Testing Approach

Abstract

Research purpose: Eradicating poverty in the world requires some strategies, such as the poor having adequate access to productive assets and increasing their returns on assets, having adequate access to education and health facilities, increasing their access to job prospects, at the same time complementing these resources with other incomes. Hence, the goal of this study is to examine the link between human resources development and poverty in Nigeria, using annual secondary data from the Statistical Bulletin of the Central Bank of Nigeria from 1990 to 2020. Design/methodology/approach: The Auto-Regressive Distributed Lag (ARDL) Technique was explicitly employed to arrive at the statistical and logical conclusions in determining the impact of human resource development in the face of poverty. In addition, the bound testing approach was used to measure Nigeria’s long-run relationship between human resource development and poverty. Findings: The study revealed that human resource development has a statistically insignificant but non-decreasing impact/effect on poverty incidence in Nigeria, based on the short-run ARDL assessment. Furthermore, the bound testing approach also indicates that there is indeed a long-run relationship between human resource development and poverty incidence in Nigeria. The study, therefore, concludes that poverty is inescapable and, hence, creates underdevelopment. The study advises governments at all levels to develop and implement policies and programs aimed at improving or enhancing the welfare and well-being of the masses through job creation in order to close the income gap between the affluent and the deprived. Originality/value/practical implications: Fighting poverty in Nigeria has been one of the major priorities of most governments in Nigeria. These can be observed from the nationwide planning policies that have been focused on adequate provision of access to both human and natural resources. There has been an enormous call for the massive upgrading of the productive capacity of the people through investment in human resources. This paper is one of the several articles employed to evaluate the impact of human resource development on the incidence of poverty in Nigeria.

Impact of economic growth, village funds, and poverty on human development in Indonesia: An analytical study from 2015 to 2022

“…In Indonesia, reducing stagnating poverty and high levels of inequality is a two-pronged social welfare challenge (Hasanah et al, 2021;Abdulrahman, 2022;Suryahadi and Izzati, 2018). A country's poverty level describes its people's quality of life based on the negative link between general well-being and poverty level (Machmud and Sidharta, 2023).…”

“…A country's poverty level describes its people's quality of life based on the negative link between general well-being and poverty level (Machmud and Sidharta, 2023). According to Wulandari et al (2022) and Abdulrahman (2022), poor people, in general, are more focused on meeting basic needs and are less interested in activities that are not directly related to basic needs, so human resources will be limited because, with a high level of poverty, people cannot get a decent education, resulting in a population that is behind and less educated, resulting in a low quality of human resources.…”

“…Poverty levels in a region, including Indonesia, impact human development (Cahyo et al, 2022). Increasing access to quality education can reduce poverty or vice versa (Dita and Mahaendra, 2020;Abdulrahman, 2022.). Thus, improving access to education, which can lower poverty rates in the long run, is intimately tied to human development (Asadullah et al, 2021).…”

“…However, the impact can vary depending on how efficiently and honestly Village funds are managed. Transparency and accountability in Village Fund management positively impact poverty levels in rural communities (Abdulrahman, 2022). According to the Ministry of Villages, Development of Disadvantaged Regions, and Transmigration 2023 data, 37.1 percent of all village funds in 2023 will advance human resources in villages.…”