Digital Entrepreneurship and Poverty Gaps Across Nigeria's Six Geopolitical Zones: The Role of E-Commerce and FinTech in Reducing Multidimensional Poverty

Abstract

Multidimensional poverty remains a major development challenge in Nigeria, with substantial variation across states and geopolitical zones. Although Nigeria’s digital economy has expanded through e - commerce, FinTech, digital payments, and platform-based enterprises, the poverty-reducing benefits of these innovations remain unevenly distributed. This paper examines how digital entrepreneurship, particularly e-commerce and financial technology, can contribute to reducing multidimensional poverty gaps across Nigeria’s six geopolitical zones. The study adopts a report-based analytical design, drawing on secondary evidence from the National Multidimensional Poverty Index, World Bank, UNDP, and recent empirical literature on digital entrepreneurship, financial inc lusion, and digital transformation in Nigeria and Africa. Illustrative zonal indicators were synthesised to compare multidimensional poverty incidence with e -commerce adoption, FinTech usage, infrastructure readiness, and digital literacy/readiness. The findings indicate an inverse relationship between digital ecosystem strength and multidimensional poverty incidence. The South West and South East, which show relatively strong digital entrepreneurship ecosystems, recorded lower poverty incidence compared with the North West and North East, where digital readiness, infrastructure, literacy, and security conditions remain weaker. The paper argues that digital entrepreneurship can reduce poverty through wider market access, lower transaction costs, improved financial inclusion, enterprise growth, and enhanced microenterprise resilience. However, these benefits depend on enabling conditions such as reliable infrastructure, logistics systems, electricity, trust, security, digital literacy, and supportive policy. The study concludes that digital entrepreneurship should be integrated into inclusive development and poverty -reduction strategies rather than treated as a stand-alone technological solution.