Who Benefits from Spending on Water and Electricity in Nigeria?: A Benefit Incidence Analysis

This study estimated Progressivity of Benefit, Average and Marginal Benefit Incidence of public spending on pipe borne water and electricity in Nigeria, using Nigeria Bureau of Statistics (NBS) Living Standard Household Survey Data of 2004. The various analyses were carried out using Distributive Analysis Stata Package (DASP) 2.1. The results of the analyses show that the spending on the utilities in Nigeria is not pro-poor. The marginal benefit incidence of spending on the utilities in Nigeria indicates that the poorest group can only benefit more than the richest group from extra spending on the utility in which their current accessibility rate is high. Finally, from the findings of this study we formulated policy recommendations that will make the public spending in Nigeria pro-poor in order to accelerate the speed at which the poor benefit more from increases in access to the utilities in the country.