What households can do to survive as economy bites

As Nigerians continue to writhe in pains from an economy that is pressing them on corners, suggestions, pieces of advice and insights are coming from various quarters on what they can do as individuals, households or businesses to survive.

The new administration in the country seems to have been too busy churning out policies and reforms, that it forgot to come up with measures for cushioning the effects of those policies which ought to have preceded the policies or run side-by-side with them.

Since the palliatives are still in the works and suffering is intensifying, Olumide Emmanuel, the CEO of Common Sense Group and a wealth creation coach, says time is now for individuals, households and organizations to adopt strategies that will enable them to survive the hash times.

“What we are going through now cannot be worse than COVID-19 and if we could survive COVID, we will survive this one. What I advise now is that we should operate with COVID mindset, that even though we are moving around, we are all the same in another lockdown,” he said.

“When you are facing tough times, first, go back to basics,” he advised further, adding, “business owners should ask themselves questions such as why do we exist as a company and what are we here to do?”

He said that time has come for businesses to be a lot more creative, advising that everybody should be able to identify where they could cut costs as, according to him, the only way to make money available was either to increase income or reduce expenditure.

At individual and household level, the wealth creation coach said that people should realize that, in this part of the world, collaboration is the new competition, explaining that, “a lot of times, we try to do things at solo level and that has affected us a great deal. In the UK today, people have cars but they don’t go out with them. They engage in car-pooling. We should be thinking of major things that cost us money and find ways to reduce them.”

He listed shelter, feeding and transportation as individual or household basic problems, saying that looking at shelter, people should begin to think of how to live communally. He cited UK where three different people rent one room, share the kitchen, parlour and other amenities.

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“They may not have known one another anywhere before. Why do you need a two-bedroom apartment as a single man that is not ready to marry in the next two or three years? Is hotel not face-me, I face-you as everybody is in his own room?” he queried.

On feeding, he advised that instead of going to the supermarket to shop for things that are expensive, a few people should come together, pool money together and go to places like Mile 12 or Otto where foodstuff is sold at wholesale prices. They should buy, come back and share.

As for transportation, he wondered why one person would be driving and three or four spaces were empty in his car. “If we live in the same neighbourhood, we can come together and use one another’s cars on a weekly basis. That is car-pooling. We have to survive anyhow. The White man said, if you cannot fly, run; if you cannot run, walk, and if you cannot walk, crawl. Just make sure you are making progress. That is the way out; everybody needs to tighten his belt,” he said.

He said that at a time like this, everybody must learn how to create wealth, pointing out that the principle for wealth creation has not changed and will never change, even though the application of those principles is personal, contextual and geographical.

“Saving is sacrosanct, but why do you save? You save to put money for your rest. One of the reasons you save is for eventuality, emergency and as a financial planning mechanism because everybody has to have six to eight months of their earnings saved up in cash,” he advised further.