THE Internally Generated Revenue (IGR) by States released on Friday shows that only Lagos, the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) and Ogun State are fiscally sustainable.

According to the ‘Internally Generated Revenue At State Level – Q4 and full year 2020 report ‘ computed by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), the 36 states of the federation and the FCT generated about N1.33 trillion in 2019, representing a decrease of about 1.93 percent when compared to what was generated in 2019. The COVID-19 pandemic and its effect on businesses across the states could have been responsible for this reduction, experts say.

The reports also reveals that Lagos State recorded the highest IGR of N418.99 billion, closely followed by Rivers with N117.19 billion and the FCT with N92.05 billion.

Delta State recorded N59.732 billion; Kaduna-N50.768 billion; Ogun-N50.749 billion; Oyo-N38.042 billion; Kano-N31.819 billion; Akwa-Ibom-N30.696 billion; Anambra-N28.009 billion; Edo-N27.184 billion; Ondo-N24.848 billion, and Enugu-N23.650 billion.

Meanwhile, Yobe recorded the least IGR of N7.779 billion, followed by Taraba-N8.114 billion; Adamawa-N8.329 billion; Gombe-N8.537 billion; Jigawa-N8.667 billion, and Ekiti-N8.716 billion.

Fiscal Sustainability of States

Fiscal sustainability is states’ ability to meet their financial obligations with little or no reliance on federal allocation and loans.

According to the FAAC and IGR data available from the NBS, in 2020, only Lagos, Ogun and the FCT were states that showed potential fiscal independence, as their IGRs were higher than the allocations they received.

Total revenue data (FAAC+IGR) showed that these three states’ IGR accounted for more than 50 per cent of their total revenue for 2020. Lagos had 78 per cent; FCT -57.85 per cent, and the Ogun State- 57.39 per cent.

All other 34 states, including the nine oil-producing states, rely about 74 per cent on federal support to meet their financial obligations.