THE ECONOMIC EVALUATION OF TRADE IN NIGERIA: A DISAGGREGATED ANALYSIS FOCUSING ON LONG-RUN EFFECTS

Abstract

The examination of the economic impact of trade in Nigeria; a dis-aggregated analysis within the period of 1986 to 2023 is carried out in this research. The variables utilized comprised of GDP, proxied for economic expansion, exports and imports made up of oil and non-oil each, inflation rate, exchange rate and equally gross capital formation. The outcomes of ADF test, showed the presence of mixed order of integration. Consequently, the key findings of this research using ARDL indicated that exports with respect to oil and non-oil have significant positive impact on the expansion of Nigeria’s economy, whereas oil imports negatively and insignificantly influenced the output expansion in Nigeria. Lastly, non-oil imports affected the output expansion in Nigeria positively and significantly. In view of these discoveries, we recommend that federal authority should focus on investing oil revenue wisely, improving local processing/refining, and stabilizing policies against price shocks so as to avoid the "resource curse" by leveraging oil wealth for broader development.