Data Analytics as a Pathway to Global Economic Performance: Issues, Challenges, Potential, and a Capacity-Building Roadmap for Nigeria

Data analytics has moved from a specialised back-office function to a central determinant of firm performance, national competitiveness and global economic value creation. This paper examines data analytics as a pathway to global economic performance, with a particular focus on Nigeria's potential to convert a young, digitally engaged population into a competitive analytics workforce. Drawing on the empirical literature linking big data analytics capability to financial and non-financial firm performance, current global market intelligence, and Nigeria's evolving policy architecture — including the National Artificial Intelligence Strategy (2025–2029), the Nigeria Data Protection Act 2023, and the Three Million Technical Talent (3MTT) programme — the paper synthesises three strands of analysis. First, it reviews the global evidence on the relationship between data analytics capability and organisational and economic performance. Second, it maps the specific potentials of data analytics for Nigeria and Nigerians across macroeconomic, sectoral and individual dimensions, substantiated with current National Bureau of Statistics and industry data. Third, it develops a staged, practically oriented roadmap through which Nigerians can acquire data analytics knowledge and skills, drawing on existing government and non-governmental capacity-building infrastructure. The paper also critically examines the structural challenges — infrastructural, financial, regulatory and human-capital — that constrain Nigeria's data analytics potential, and situates these within the broader empirical literature on big data analytics adoption barriers in African small and medium enterprises. It concludes with policy and institutional recommendations intended to convert Nigeria's demographic and digital assets into measurable economic performance gains, and identifies directions for future empirical research.