Nigerians Spent N3.25 Trillion On Airtime, Data, Others In 2021 - NCC

The Nigerian Communications Commission (NCC) has announced that  Nigerians and other citizens within the country spent N3.25 trillion on airtime, data, and other communications services in 2021.

This represents a 12.74 per cent increase over the N2.88 trillion spent in 2020 and a 31.55 per cent increase over the N2.47 trillion spent in 2019, indicating that telecom services are becoming increasingly important.

A report titled, ‘2021 Subscriber/Network Data Annual Report,’ by the NCC said, “Finance – This collation was based on the submissions received from service providers.

It indicates that the total revenue in the sector recorded was N3.25tn.”

Nigerians made 173.56 billion minutes of calls in 2021, up 15.07 per cent from 150.83 billion minutes in 2020. From 8.22 billion in 2020 to 9.46 billion in 2021, the total number of SMS sent increased by 15.06 per cent.

Operators in GSM, fixed wired, Internet service providing, value service addition, collocation and infrastructure sharing, and other areas made revenue.

GSM operators accounted for 85.42 per cent of overall telecoms revenue.

According to the NCC, the suspension of new SIM sales and registrations, SIM swaps, and porting activities had an impact on the sector's subscriber growth.

“Subscriber number decreased from 204.60 million subscribers in 2020 to 195.46 million active voice subscriptions as of December 2021 with a loss of 9.14 million subscriptions.

“This represents about a 4.46 per cent decline in total subscription within the period under consideration.

"The decrease in Operators’ subscriber base was attributed majorly to the effect of the directive from NCC in December 2020 to all GSM Operators to suspend the sale and registration of new SIMs, SIM swaps and all porting activities.”

“The objective of the audit exercise was to verify and ensure compliance by Mobile Network Operators with the set quality standards and requirements of SIM Card Registration as issued by the Federal Ministry of Communications and Digital Economy and the Commission.”

Foreign direct investment in the telecoms industry was $417.48 million in 2021, according to the NCC.

The year's data usage increased by 68.22%, from 209,917.40TB in 2020 to 353,118.89TB in 2021.

"The year 2020 was the genuine COVID-19 period and people were striving to graduate online," Adeolu Ogunbanjo, President of the National Association of Telecoms Subscribers, said of the increase in telecoms usage.

“In 2021, there was a full blast in online activity. Working from home, an increase in online economic and commercial transactions which were all on telecoms infrastructure.

"This growth was meant to be. 2021 witnessed an uptake in online activities as people had to use their devices online.

“Data usage and calls increased. The growth might be stunted in 2022 because about 70 million subscribers cannot make calls presently.

"Perhaps data, yes. But the implementation of the SIM-NIN policy will have its effect.”

The Chief Operating Officer of the Association of Telecommunications Companies of Nigeria, Ajibola Olude, added, “There are many factors that are responsible for the increase in the usage of telecom services, one of them is that productivity is now driven by telecom services.

“If you go to any sector today, their growth, their productivity is driven by telecom services. For instance, hospitality, banking, and insurance.

"Telecoms is showing its ability to serve all the sectors of the economy. This growth is expected in 2022 due to the anticipated increase in the adoption of telecom services.”