Nigeria’s Entrepreneurship Index Increases to 0.47 Index Points As Businesses Provided Over 14,000 Jobs in 2025 Says New Report

By: Olufemi Orunsola 

A new report by one of Nigeria’s leading players in Entrepreneurship research and development, the Fate Foundation Institute has stated that the State of Entrepreneurship Index for Nigeria rose marginally to 0.47 index points in 2025 from 0.46 in 2024, while businesses provided over 14,000 jobs in the year 2025.

OPEN TELEVISION NAIJA (OTN) News reports as gathered that the new State of Entrepreneurship in Nigeria Report released mid week by the Institute further states that that this marginal increase reflects a modest improvement in Nigeria’s entrepreneurial landscape since 2001 when it started measuring entrepreneurship development across Nigeria.

The report, which covered 10,882 businesses across all 36 states and the FCT, presents Nigeria’s State of Entrepreneurship Index and provides analyses of female and youth-led enterprises, net job creation, key constraints facing businesses, opportunities and policy recommendations.

Significantly, the FATE Foundation report which stated that although small businesses reported a net job loss over the past year, Nigerian businesses created a total of 14,269 jobs in 2025.  

Speaking on the report, the Minister of State for Industry, Trade and Investment, Senator John Enoh, said the only reason Nigeria’ economy has not collapsed is because of the resilience of micro, small, and medium enterprises, MSMEs, adding that the country cannot build an industrial economy if her entrepreneurs cannot access the capital that it requires for growth.

Enoh who spoke in a keynote address during the presentation of the report at the 11th Policy Dialogue Series, PDS, on Entrepreneurship titled: “From Enterprise to Industry: Unlocking MSME Potential for Nigeria’s Industrialisation," noted that the government still has so much to do for entrepreneurs.

The Minister pointed out that the sub sector has been able to make the progress that it has because of the resilience and creative ingenuity of its members.

In his words, “I think that the more the government pays attention to this ecosystem, the more the government works to respond to what the challenges and the issues are for MSMEs, there would be some lease of new life for the MSMEs in our country.

“So MSMEs, of course, represent the energy and creativity and demographic power of the nation. They make up 96 percent of businesses. And these numbers remind us that Nigeria’s economic destiny rests on the success of its entrepreneurs.  

“We are working towards building an industrial economy where MSMEs do not struggle, but where MSMEs scale, where manufacturing growth does not shrink, where innovation leads, not lacks; youth enterprise becomes a source of national power, not national frustration”.

Earlier in his opening remarks, Founder and Chairman, FATE Foundation, Mr. Fola Adeola, said for several years, the FATE Institute consistently championed the cause for a simplified, transparent and fair tax regime for the MSMEs.

He stated that the institute’s data repeatedly showed that administrative friction and complexity were disproportionately burdening micro-businesses and slowing urbanisation.

OTN News observes that the new State of Entrepreneurship Index report is coming at a time when Nigerians are grappling with harsh socio-economic realities while the Tinubu-led Federal Government is struggling to redirect the economy to favour MSMEs via multiple relief policies such as provision of single digit loans to MSMEs, tax reforms and other incentives.