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By Chinenye Anuforo
Nigeria has launched a multi-sector drive to capture a larger share of the $4 trillion global services trade, positioning talent export as its next frontier for job creation, foreign exchange earnings and economic diversification.
The framework, spearheaded by the Nigerian Talent Export Programme (NATEP) with backing from the World Economic Forum, government ministries and industry partners, aims to transform Nigeria’s workforce into a globally competitive supply base for outsourced and digitally delivered services.
NATEP National Coordinator Teju Abisoye said Nigeria’s services output despite contributing 50 per cent to GDP represents only 10 per cent of exports, a gap she described as both a risk and an economic opportunity.
“The world is trading services at unprecedented scale, yet Africa’s share is below one per cent. Our strategy is to change that trajectory, starting with Nigeria. This is about creating over one million jobs, earning foreign exchange differently, and building a talent economy that trades expertise, not commodities,” Abisoye said.
A central pillar of the plan is the alignment of industry demand, training institutions, and international labour markets, with special focus on business process outsourcing, digital services, and technology-enabled remote work.
Presenting global workforce insights, World Economic Forum’s Manager for Reskilling Revolution and Skills Initiatives, Genesis Elhussien, said employer surveys show 41 per cent of skills in Nigeria will change within five years, with demand surging in artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, data analytics and machine learning.
“Companies are adopting new technologies faster than workers are being trained for them. The biggest barrier to productivity today is not innovation, it is the absence of the right talent to implement it,” she said, citing data from a survey of 1,000 global firms representing 14 million workers.
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Minister of Industry, Trade and Investment, Dr. Jumoke Oduwole, announced new federal approvals to accelerate the country’s entry into digital and cross-border talent markets, including a national services export coordination framework to be led by NATEP, a National Intellectual Property Policy, and plans to finalise the African digital trade protocol to ease regional and global market access.
“Digital and mobile services exports alone grew from $7.3bn in 2010 to $1.25bn in 2022. With coordination and scale, Nigeria can unlock more than $17bn in new export revenue, create jobs at speed and strengthen foreign exchange inflows,” Oduwole said.
Education Minister, Dr. Maruf Tunji Alausa, linked the initiative to Nigeria’s demographic advantage, noting that with 140 million citizens under 30, the country is positioned to fill widening global labour shortages — if its workforce is trained at scale and matched to high-demand fields.
He disclosed that 2.2 million job openings currently exist in technology-based roles, including 268,000 in software development, 138,000 in cybersecurity, 140,000 in AI and machine learning, and more than 110,000 in automation and predictive analytics. He listed expanding digital certification programmes, technical training reforms, and partnerships with global learning platforms as part of government’s response.
Officials confirmed that a comprehensive workforce assessment conducted with the WEF Skills Accelerator Network will be released in the coming weeks to guide national execution and investment priorities.
Industry leaders at the forum called for tighter integration between employer pipelines and training outcomes, arguing that Nigeria’s biggest constraint is not population size but employability scale.
“This is not a theoretical conversation. It is a trade strategy. Talent must be standardised, certified, exported and paid for like any other national resource,” one private sector executive said.
