Nigeria’s $1tn Economy At Stake If Women Remain Locked Out

I am a true believer that when women thrive, the rest of society benefits. If one financially empowered woman can multiply the outcomes in her community, then several financially empowered women can transform the economy.

However, in Nigeria, the numbers show that women remain systematically excluded from the very levers that drive prosperity: finance, innovation, and decision-making. This is why I am convinced that Nigeria’s ambition to become a $1tn economy by 2030 cannot be achieved if half of its population, which happens to be women, remains locked out of opportunity.

According to the 2025 McKinsey Women in the Workplace report, women hold only one in three formal sector entry-level roles, yet they make up more than half of Nigeria’s working-age population. That imbalance at the base creates a ripple effect all the way up. In financial services, the problem is even sharper.

In Nigeria, women make up 47 per cent of entry-level staff but only 28 per cent of senior leadership. It means: fewer women managers, fewer women in decision-making, and ultimately, fewer women influencing the economic and financial systems that determine how resources are allocated.

The pipeline narrows so quickly that the very rooms where lending rules, credit systems, and inclusion strategies are designed often exclude women’s voices.

At the heart of this exclusion is a contradiction: women are disproportionately excluded from financial services, yet when they do gain access, they outperform.

Our 2023 Access to Financial Services in Nigeria (A2F) survey data at EFInA (Enhancing Financial Inclusion and Advancement) shows that women’s financial inclusion lags significantly behind men’s, with 30% of Nigerian women financially excluded compared to 21% of men. This represents millions of women locked out of the financial system, unable to access the credit, savings, and capital needed to start and grow businesses.

The Gates Foundation’s What Women Want survey confirms what many of us already know: the number one systemic barrier women face in achieving economic success is lack of start-up capital. Women want to build, to innovate, to scale, but the system refuses to open the door. When women are finally given the chance, they do not just walk through; they transform the room.

According to the World Bank’s Women Entrepreneurs Finance Initiative (We-Fi), women-led businesses have repayment rates exceeding per cent. That is NOT a risk profile.

So, why does the gap persist? The answer lies not only in bank policies or regulatory frameworks but in who is at the table making decisions. Nigeria’s financial sector, like much of its private sector counterparts, remains dominated by men. This imbalance matters.

Who designs products? Who sets risk thresholds? Who defines what a “creditworthy” entrepreneur looks like? Without women in the room, the system continues to default to designs that exclude women.

Hiring more women into leadership is a strategy for economic growth. When women are in decision-making roles, they bring perspectives shaped by lived experiences. They recognise that women running informal trading stalls, farming cooperatives, or tech start-ups are not invisible or peripheral but central to Nigeria’s economic future.

They design credit products that reflect reality rather than myth, investment strategies that see opportunity rather than risk.

A 2022 McKinsey report showed that companies with more women in leadership were 21% more likely to outperform on profitability. In financial services, this translates into smarter lending, more innovative product design, and stronger portfolio performance. This is not about quotas. It is about mandates.

In 2013, Central Bank Governor Sanusi Lamido Sanusi required banks to reserve at least 30% of board seats and 40% of senior management positions for women. The policy helped the Nigerian banking sector grow, making it a leader in female representation.

By 2023, women held 29.4 per cent of board seats—up from 24.8 per cent in 2020—though still below the global average of 38.1 per cent.

The lesson is clear: progress follows mandates, not goodwill. If banks, investors, and regulators extend this logic to leadership and product design teams, the ripple effects will be transformative.

Imagine a Nigeria where loan approval committees include women who understand the financial realities of market women, smallholder farmers, or female tech founders. Imagine product design teams led by women who know that asking a woman for her husband’s guarantor before approving her loan is not just outdated but discriminatory.

Imagine investment boards where women vote to back ideas that solve problems women actually face, from childcare financing to women-led health innovations.

We do not have to imagine for long. The evidence is already here. When women have led interventions, results have followed. The EFInA A2F data shows that women who are financially included are more likely to save, invest in their children’s education, and reinvest in their communities.

The World Bank has found that closing gender gaps in access to finance could raise GDP by as much as 12 per cent in low—and middle-income countries.

For Nigeria, the stakes are even higher. If women remain locked out, our growth projections will remain a mirage. But if we let women in, we unlock not just their potential but the nation’s.

The path forward is clear. Nigerian companies, especially in finance and investment, must adopt gender mandates that guarantee women a seat at the table where products, policies, and portfolios are designed.

Regulators must enforce disclosure of gender workforce data so we can measure progress, not just intentions. And society must hold leaders accountable for outcomes.

When women lead, they do not just open doors for themselves; they redesign the entire building so that more people can walk in. If Nigeria is serious about financial inclusion, then the most important policy we can adopt is simple: Let women in.

Collins-Ogbuo is the Advocacy Lead at EFInA, where she also heads the Inclusion for All Initiative.