In the Economist:
More here...official statistics probably greatly underestimate the size of the diaspora, since they are not likely to include illegal immigrants. What is certain, though, is that the number of Nigerians living abroad has increased rapidly in recent decades. Census figures in Britain show that the number of British residents born in Nigeria more than doubled in the decade to 2011, to 191,000, making this the immigrant population with the second-fastest growth, after Poles. A census in America estimated the country’s Nigerian-born population at 221,000. Add in their children, and the diaspora in America swells to just under 400,000, according to the Migration Policy Institute. The UN reckons that some 1.2m Nigerian-born people currently live abroad.
Whatever the exact numbers, that diaspora is an important source of money, markets and skills for its home country. The World Bank estimates that Nigerians abroad sent back some $21 billion in remittances in 2013. That adds up to a quarter of their country’s earnings from oil exports, and more now that the price of oil has fallen. Nigerian expats also buy a lot of stuff made back home. For example, they enjoy films produced in Nollywood, as well as familiar packaged foods, including Maggi condiment cubes. The ones made in Nigeria contain fermented soya, which is reminiscent of Hausa cooking in the country’s north, and are sold in British supermarkets.
