Trade Openness and Life Expectancy: Evidence from Nigeria

Abstract

The health sector in Nigeria is at risk following barriers to international trade, as trade across Nigeria and the rest of the world may not be sufficiently promoting health indicators in particular life expectancy. This paper examined the impact of trade openness on life expectancy in Nigeria from 1986 to 2023. This paper utilized the autoregressive distributed lag model (ARDL) on trade openness, foreign direct investment, hospital infrastructure, electricity consumption and government health expenditure. From the result, it was showed that trade openness had a negative impact on life expectancy, while the three lagged value of foreign direct investment had a positive impact on infant mortality. As a way of policy implementation, the Government should create mechanisms to control the extent to which the economy is opened to the external world. This is because illicit and substandard health goods could be brough tinto the country which could have adverse and negative effect on the health come in the long run in Nigeria.