I was delighted to be in Lagos yesterday for the US-Nigeria Strategic Dialogue, convened by The Heritage Foundation in partnership with the American Business Council Nigeria at The Wheatbaker, Ikoyi, alongside senior American and Nigerian policymakers, investors and partners.

As the United States celebrates 250 years of independence, the Dialogue advanced a proposition I wholeheartedly welcome, that Nigeria’s importance will increasingly be measured by what Nigeria possesses that the world will need. Our energy and critical minerals, our abundant farmland and our strategic Atlantic location rightly anchored the day’s deliberations, and together they speak to a nation of extraordinary promise.

To those assets, I would add one more, the health and wellbeing of the Nigerian people, upon which every ambition in energy, trade, infrastructure and security ultimately depends. Nigeria accounted for nearly three in every ten maternal deaths recorded worldwide in 2023. A growing workforce becomes a strategic advantage when its mothers survive childbirth, its newborns thrive and its children are well nourished in the first thousand days of life.

The five-year US-Nigeria health memorandum of understanding, which joins some $2.1 billion in American support with close to $3 billion in new Nigerian health spending, already shows what shared commitment and shared responsibility can deliver. The same principle can guide American and Nigerian enterprise as it invests in reliable power for health facilities, resilient supply chains for essential medicines, and the cold chains that carry them to the communities that need them most.

As the Dialogue moves from discussion to delivery, I respectfully encourage that the health and wellbeing of Nigerian women, children and families be counted among the priority areas of its Statement of Principles. It is a cause to which the Wellbeing Foundation Africa has long been devoted, and one we will gladly carry into the partnerships ahead.

My sincere thanks to Dr James Jay Carafano, Ms Margaret Olele and Mr Ayo Otuyalo for a timely and important convening.

 

View this post on Instagram

 

A post shared by Toyin Saraki (@toyinsaraki)