Remittance multiplier effect: do migrant remittances impact the mass of non-migrant households in Nigeria?

Remittances to Nigeria, like to the rest of the developing world, show rapid growth in the last two decades. This work estimated the effects of these emergent migrant transfers on the Nigerian non-migrant households who do not receive the funds. These non-migrant households constitute the larger population share, and like the remittance dependent households, are often characterised by low income, inadequate access to resources and found mostly in agricultural related risk coping strategies. The Nigerian General Household Survey and the National Living Standard Survey were sources of a pooled data used for the analyses. Both surveys conducted by the Nigerian Bureau of statistics gained supports from the World Bank. From the perspective of the compound multiplier theory, the “two stage least square” technique was employed in the data analysis. Results showed that remittances did not only improve migrant household consumption, it also increased incomes of non-migrants’ households through its multiplier effect.