The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) says no fewer than 3,381,228 persons were internally displaced across 14 states in Nigeria in 2023.

This is contained in the Demographic Bulletin 2023 edition released on Tuesday in Abuja by the NBS.

The bulletin is a compendium of data collated from administrative sources and surveys to support policy formulation and research.

The report said that Borno accounted for the largest share of Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) at 50.62 per cent, accounting for 1,711,481 individuals.

This was followed by Benue with 11.67 per cent accounting for 394,567 individuals and Katsina with 7.23 per cent, accounting for 244,380 individuals.

It added that Gombe, Nasarawa, and Kano states recorded the lowest shares of IDPs at 1.55 per cent (52,383), 0.61 per cent (20,580) and 0.46 per cent (15,549), respectively.

The report also revealed that Nigeria’s projected population from the National Population Commission stood at 221,250,127 in 2023, comprising 112,434,239 males and 108,815,888 females.

At the sub-national level, it showed that Kano state recorded the highest population at 15,671,491, followed by Lagos state with 13,710,862 and Katsina state with 10,661,373.

The report listed Nasarawa and Bayelsa as the least populous states, with 2,948,849 and 2,583,352 respectively.

On reproductive health, the report showed that maternal conditions accounted for the largest share of expenditure in 2022, representing 50.22 per cent of capital spending and 52.46 per cent of recurrent spending.

According to the report, findings from the Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey (MICS) 2021 indicated that the proportion of women with a live birth in the two years preceding the survey who received antenatal care during pregnancy from a skilled provider increased from 50 per cent in 2011 to 67 per cent in 2018.

“However, this proportion decreased slightly to 63 per cent in 2021.

The report also indicated that Anambra had the lowest proportion of women with unmet needs for birth spacing at 3.8 per cent.

This means that only 3.8 per cent of women in Anambra want to space their births, but are not able to access family planning methods.”

The report further indicated that data from the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) showed that the United Kingdom remained the highest source of inward remittances to Nigeria in 2023, contributing 12.38 billion dollars, compared to 12.76 billion dollars recorded in 2022.

It also showed that the United States of America recorded the highest outward remittance flow at 13.12 million dollars in 2022.

The bulletin also reported 968 cases of human trafficking in 2023, covering both foreign and domestic incidents.

It added that foreign travels linked to prostitution accounted for the highest number of cases at 173.

According to the bulletin, this was followed by procurement of persons for sexual exploitation with 120 cases, and buying and selling of persons for exploitation with 102 cases.

On employment trends, data from the National Electronic Labour Exchange (NELEX) showed that private sector job advertisements increased from 90 in 2021 to 104 in 2022 and 150 in 2023.

The report noted a corresponding rise in the number of employers registered on the platform, though no federal government jobs were advertised during the period under review.