Apart from providing services, the private sector plays a great part in Nigeria’s economy by gainfully employing thousands of Nigerians thus helping to reduce the unemployment rate which has skyrocketed in recent times.
According to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS), Nigeria's unemployment rate surged to 5% in Q3, 2023, up from 4.2% in the previous period and the jobless rate among young people aged 15-24 also increased from 7.2% to 8.6%.
The International Labour Organisation (ILO) recently revealed that the job gap which measures the number of unemployed persons who want to work stands at 402 million persons in 2024.
10 Nigerian companies with the highest number of employees
According to Nairametrics, the table below shows the total number of employees in 10 companies which cut across finance to manufacturing and the growth figures in 2022 and 2023:
| S/N | Company | No. of employees 2022 | No. of employees 2023 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Dangote Cement | 18,693 | 19,073 |
| 2 | UBA | 9,597 | 10,007 |
| 3 | FBN Holdings | 7,972 | 8,773 |
| 4 | Zenith | 8,007 | 8,164 |
| 5 | Access Holdings | 6,824 | 7,334 |
| 6 | GTCO | 5,192 | 5,487 |
| 7 | Flour Mills of Nigeria | 5,919 | 5,404 |
| 8 | FCMB | 3,342 | 3,554 |
| 9 | Fidelity Bank | 3,038 | 3,063 |
| 10 | Nestle Nigeria | 2,320 | 2,375 |
From the table, the finance industry takes a large share of the companies with seven banks represented out of the 10 firms.
All the companies represented witnessed a rise in the number of staff in 2024 compared to 2023 except Flour Mills of Nigeria as its staff headcount dropped from 5,919 in 2023, to 5,404 in 2024.
The 10 companies recorded an overall growth of 2,330 employees as the overall employee figures increased from 70,904 in 2022, to 73,234 in 2023.