Nigeria’s new D30 digital platform is built around a problem that businesses in the creative and tourism sectors have long faced: it is difficult to attract serious capital when market information is incomplete, inconsistent or hard for investors to compare.
The government says the platform is intended to address data gaps across tourism and the creative industries. It has set an ambition for these sectors to contribute $100 billion to GDP and create more than three million jobs by 2030. Those figures are targets, not guaranteed results.
Visibility is not the same as investability
A sector can attract public attention without being easy to finance. Investors need more than stories about talent and cultural influence. They need credible estimates of demand, revenue models, distribution channels, operating costs, infrastructure constraints and the ability of businesses to grow beyond one-off projects.
For a film producer, that may mean reliable information about screens, audience demand and distribution. For fashion businesses, it can include manufacturing capacity, order volumes, export access and payment reliability. Tourism operators need comparable information about visitor flows, transport, accommodation and seasonality.
What a useful platform must deliver
First, the data must be updated regularly and explain where it comes from. Second, it should help users compare locations and subsectors, not simply list them. Third, businesses should be able to turn the information into commercial decisions, while public agencies use it to identify infrastructure and policy gaps.
There is also a measurement challenge. Job creation and economic contribution should be tracked with clear definitions so policymakers and investors can distinguish new activity from existing activity being counted differently.
The execution test
D30 could become useful infrastructure for investment if it offers dependable data that firms, lenders and public institutions actually use. Its impact will be judged less by the ambition of the headline targets than by whether it improves the quality of decisions and helps viable businesses secure capital, customers and capacity to grow.
Context source: Punch Newspapers, October 13, 2026.