British Council Creative Economy

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Nigeria

Nigeria has the largest economy in Sub-Saharan Africa and its fast growing tech, film and fashion sectors have become a strong exporter of culture.

Nigeria’s economy has become the largest in the continent with a population of 174 million and is expected to be one of the world’s top 20 economies by 2020. A member of the MINT countries, Nigeria is also coined to be one of the next four largest emerging and developing economies after the BRIC countries.

2015/16 see a major UK/Nigeria season of work, set to be one of the British Council biggest arts programme co-created in Africa. Working closely with our colleagues in British Council Nigeria, we are building a programme which hopes to strengthen international, interdisciplinary and collabroative ways of working for the UK and Nigeria. Read more about the season here

Playable City, a programme of digital arts installations creating new ways to engage with the urban landscape, is coming to Lagos.  Our fashion programme, Fashion DNA, aims to to support the development of young peoples digital making skills in the fashion industry - from online marketing to photography and post-prodution. And Creaitve Hustles will be connecting experts and profeesionals from the arts with young Nigerians.

The overall ambition behind our work in Nigeria has been to celebrate successes of practitioners in the sector, encourage enterprise and introduce new models and methods of working.  Couple this with it's 500,000 strong Nollywood industry, internationally renowned fashion sector and growing tech community and Nigeria's creative economy is quickly gaining international recognition.

6 Organisations/people to follow:

Creative Lagos is a mapping project and a communal platform for collaboration, commentary and promotion for Lagosian culutral space and organisations. The emergence of creative spaces in Lagos is set to transform not just the creative economy but the wider economy and society with it. 

Femi Longe, Co-Creation Hub (@Cc_HUB) is Nigeria’s first open living lab and pre-incubation space for technologists, social entrepreneurs, government, tech companies, impact investors and hackers to co-create new solutions to social problems in Nigeria.

Nkiru Asika, CEO Enterprise Creative (@EntCreativeNG) is a social enterprise set up to build capacity and support small businesses in the creative sector.

Bisi SilvaCentre for Contemporary Art (@ccalagos) is an independent non-profit making visual art organisation set up in December 2007 to provide a platform for the development, presentation, and discussion of contemporary visual art and culture.

MoMo Nigeria, (@momonigeria) organised by a group of dedicated volunteers from around the world, MoMo Nigeria provides a virtual hub for developers, designers and influential individuals to share ideas, best practices and trends from global markets. 

Victor Okigbo, iDEA Nigeria (@iDEAng) provides essential support to entrepreneurs to build software skills, solutions and businesses critical to their success. Entrepreneurs accepted into iDEA Centres receive support in the way of physical work space, shared facilities, training, mentoring and access to capital.