Nigeria’s creative economy may already have the ingredients of a significant export industry, but its biggest challenge is not creating global demand. It is capturing more of the economic value generated by that demand.
Nigerian music, film, fashion and digital content have established audiences well beyond the country’s borders. Afrobeats alone has become a global commercial phenomenon, while Nigerian creators increasingly operate in international markets. Yet the growth of global reach raises a more consequential economic question: how much of the revenue generated by Nigerian creativity accrues to Nigerian creators, businesses and the wider economy?
That question sits at the heart of a broader opportunity for Nigeria. Unlike many exports, creative products can be developed domestically and sold repeatedly across international markets. A song, film, design, game or piece of intellectual property can generate income long after its initial production, creating opportunities for employment, foreign exchange earnings and business formation.
Speaking at the US-Nigeria Council breakfast during the 81st United Nations General Assembly, UNGA 81, Group Chief Executive of Oando Plc, Jubril Adewale Tinubu, argued that Nigeria should therefore rethink the economic status of its creative industries.
Nigeria’s creative economy is valued at about $6.4 billion, he noted, while the music industry generated more than $600 million in 2024. Afrobeats recorded more than 2.2 billion global Spotify streams, providing a measure of the international demand for Nigerian creative output.
The figures are significant, but the larger opportunity lies in what happens around them.
Global consumption of Nigerian creative content does not automatically translate into equivalent domestic economic value. The revenues generated by a successful creative product flow through a complex ecosystem of platforms, distributors, publishers, labels, investors, managers and rights owners. Without the financial and commercial infrastructure to ensure that Nigerian creators and companies retain a greater share of that value, rising global consumption can coexist with relatively limited domestic value capture.
This is why Tinubu’s proposition is less about entertainment policy than economic structure.
“We need to think about the creative arts differently: not just as culture and entertainment, but as an export industry,” he said.
Such a shift would require Nigeria to approach creative assets differently from traditional commodities. The country’s most valuable creative assets are often intangible, copyrights, catalogues, brands, audiences and intellectual property. Yet these assets are not always easily financed through conventional banking structures.
Developing investment models around them could allow successful artists and creative businesses to move beyond project-by-project income towards scalable enterprises. Stronger intellectual-property protection, more efficient royalty collection, international distribution networks and access to growth capital would also determine how much of the sector’s expanding global value is retained locally.
The foreign-exchange implications are particularly relevant. Nigeria’s export earnings remain heavily concentrated in commodities, especially oil. Creative exports provide another potential source of foreign revenue, while being comparatively less dependent on physical logistics.
That does not make the creative economy a substitute for traditional exports. Its importance is that it broadens the country’s export base and creates economic activity around skills, intellectual property and services.
The opportunity extends well beyond music. Nollywood, fashion, advertising, animation, gaming, publishing, photography and digital media increasingly intersect with global consumer markets. Each can generate export revenue, but each also requires commercial infrastructure to scale.
The central policy challenge, therefore, is moving from celebrating creative success to building an economy around it.
That means creating conditions under which creators can raise capital, protect their intellectual property, build companies and retain a larger share of the value their work generates internationally.
Tinubu captured the broader proposition succinctly: “Our creativity is cultural influence. It is also economic power.”
For Nigeria, the next step is converting that influence into a stronger domestic economic return.
