ABUJA: Nigeria's economy contracted by 1.92% in 2020, the statistics office said, marking the country's second full-year recession since 2016 reflecting the COVID-19 pandemic and a fall in revenue from lower oil prices.

In 2019, Africa's largest economy grew 2.27%.

Nigeria was grappling with low growth before the pandemic triggered recession and created large financing gaps including dollar shortages.

In the final quarter of 2020 it managed to achieve economic growth of 0.11%, the National Bureau of Statistics said on Thursday, following contractions in the second and third quarters.

The World Bank had estimated a 4% contraction in 2020 while the IMF had forecast a 3.2% contraction.

The IMF said in December it expected Nigeria's economy to grow by 1.5% in 2021.