NITDA Digital Literacy Dashboard Logs 2.77m Trainings: What It Means

Nigeria now has a single place to track who is training whom in basic digital skills. The National Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) has unveiled a National Digital Literacy Dashboard at the 2026 National Digital Literacy Workshop in Abuja, and its first figures give a useful, if early, picture of where the country stands. This article is for business owners, HR managers, training providers and anyone who wants to understand what the new data means in practice.

Key takeaways

• The dashboard records 2,769,512 digital literacy training achievements over the past three years.
• Data comes from 252 active reporting organisations, covering all 36 states, the FCT and all 774 local government areas.
• Cisco, NITDA and Meta account for the largest shares of reported training.
• The national targets are 70% digital literacy by 2027 and 95% by 2030.
• NITDA itself stresses that training counts are not the same as verified skills, and plans proper assessments.

What NITDA launched

The dashboard sits under NITDA’s Digital Literacy for All (DL4ALL) programme, which started in 2024. It pulls together reports from government agencies, companies, NGOs, cooperatives and community groups that run digital skills training, so that their work can be seen in one place instead of scattered across separate reports. NITDA Director-General Kashifu Inuwa led the launch.

According to NITDA, the tool is meant to help authorities spot underserved communities, cut down on duplicated training in the same areas and direct resources more effectively. Reports put coverage at 14,664 communities across the country.

What the numbers show

Who is doing the training

The biggest single contributor is Cisco, with 1,073,604 reported training achievements, followed by NITDA with 960,424 and Meta Platforms with 333,816. Other named contributors include Imo Digital City Limited, the Sokoto State Ministry of Innovation and Digital Economy, the Bureau for ICT and Digital Economy, state technology agencies in Jigawa, Kaduna and Zamfara, and the Centre for Information Technology and Development (CITAD). Companies make up the majority of reporting organisations (151 of 252), followed by government institutions and NGOs.

Who is being reached

The breakdown shows the training is reaching young people and informal-sector workers most. More than 2.09 million beneficiaries are under 35, and about 1.6 million are informal-sector workers. Other figures point to gaps: women make up 32.9% of participants, rural beneficiaries number 65,767 and persons with disabilities 17,156.

How far there is to go

Nigeria Communications Week reports that the 2.77 million figure is 5.54% of a target of 50 million beneficiaries by 2027. With the 2027 deadline little more than a year away, the dashboard makes the size of the remaining task very visible.

An honest caveat about the data

NITDA has been open that the dashboard measures training activity, not proven ability. A “training achievement” is not necessarily a unique person, and someone who sat through a session may not have reached a defined skill level. The agency says it plans assessments to check whether beneficiaries actually communicate better online, protect themselves from fraud, find information confidently and improve their livelihoods. That outcome-focused approach is the right one, and the results will be worth watching.

The skills being measured follow the 2023 National Digital Literacy Framework, which covers six areas: using devices and software, information and data literacy, communication and collaboration, creating digital content, digital safety, and problem-solving.

The wider push on digital skills

The launch fits a broader push this week. At a Cisco instructor conference in Abuja, Inuwa urged educators to move from exam-focused teaching to hands-on digital skills, and the Minister of Education, Dr Tunji Alausa, said the national curriculum has been updated to introduce digital technology at primary school level. He also mentioned work with the Nigerian Communications Commission on zero-rated data access to educational content. NITDA has also partnered with the NYSC, whose Digital Literacy Champions have reported over 803,000 trainees through an informal-sector initiative.

Why it matters for businesses

For small and medium-sized businesses, digital literacy is not an abstract national statistic. It decides whether staff can use accounting software, spot a phishing message, handle customer data properly or serve customers online. The fact that informal-sector workers are a large share of those trained is encouraging for traders and artisans moving onto digital payments and online sales. The low share of women and rural participants, on the other hand, signals talent that is still being missed.

What you should do

• If you run staff training, consider registering your programme with NITDA’s dashboard so your work counts toward national data. NITDA has called on companies, schools, state governments and civil society groups to submit credible data. Check nitda.gov.ng for the official process.
• Build safety into every course. Digital safety is one of the six framework areas, and fraud awareness is one of the outcomes NITDA wants to measure. Include it from day one.
• Test, do not just count. Follow NITDA’s lead: after training, check that people can actually perform the task, such as setting up two-step verification or spotting a fake payment alert.
• Close your own gaps. Make sure women, older staff and branch workers outside the main city get the same training opportunities.
• Watch for follow-up data. Outcome assessments, once published, will be far more useful than raw training counts for planning hiring and skills budgets.

Sources

• Nigeria Communications Week: NITDA unveils National Digital Literacy Dashboard
• TechAfrica News: NITDA launches Digital Literacy Dashboard
• Nigeria Communications Week: Digital skills hold the key to Nigeria’s AI-driven future

Featured image: Photo: “Computer Training” by danxoneil, CC BY 2.0, via Openverse — source