Hurray for Nollywood

Sources: PricewaterhouseCoopers, Statista, National
Association of Theater Owners, DIBD India

Nigerian cinema… Nollywood, produces about 1,000 films a year — a cinematic output that eclipses Hollywood’s and is second only to India’s Bollywood. And the industry continues to develop. Nigerian box office revenues, which have nearly doubled since 2009, are projected to grow an additional 70 percent by 2018, to $171 million a year, according to a report by the consulting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers.

By international standards, the typical Nollywood film is a bare-bones affair: Budgets rarely exceed $40,000, cameras are handheld, set design is nearly nonexistent, and filming and post-production take just a few weeks. But the casual, do-it-yourself nature of this industry belies its size and importance, said Vicki Myburgh, a media and entertainment analyst in South Africa for PwC, who said that the Nigerian movie business was thought to be the country’s second largest employer after agriculture.

While such statistics are impressive, Ms. Myburgh said that considering that Nigeria sometimes makes more than 100 films a month and has a population of more than 170 million people, its domestic movie business should be generating much more revenue. In 2013, all filmed entertainment in Nigeria — including video, streaming and box office sales — grossed just $178 million, according to PwC.

The biggest problem, Ms. Myburgh said, is that the majority of Nigerian films are bootlegged immediately after release. She cited the World Bank’s estimate that 90 percent of the DVDs in circulation in Nigeria are illegal copies. “If you factor all those pirated films in, you begin to get a sense of how big the industry really is,” she said.

Dear Nollywood, Bollywood May Double Revenue by 2018

WHILE Nollywood is still being spoon-fed by President Goodluck Jonathan’s largesse, the Indian entertainment industry, according to a new study, is soaring in commercial maturation, and is expected to double its revenue to $37.2 billion by 2018, growing at a compound annual rate of 15 percent.

An annual report by consulting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers India and the Confederation of Indian Industry said that in 2013, the Indian entertainment industry recorded revenue of about $18.3 billion, a 19 percent gain over the previous year.

The entertainment industry has contributed strongly to India’s economy, according to other recent reports. And interestingly too, while TV is predicted to be a big growth driver, the film business reportedly will also grow steadily.

Against the backdrop of digital migration in 2015, one begins to wonder what will happen in the Nigerian entertainment space when the spectrum is further enlarged for more contents.

Nollywood: A Resource That Needs Control

Resource Control has become an important political and economic lexicon in modern geo political realities. In the emerging economies of the world, most especially in Africa, resource control has accounted for numerous armed conflicts, political instability, and economic stagnation.

Resources in emerging economies like Nigeria are primarily ascribed to natural & physical properties like oil and gas, agricultural products, gold, diamond and like products that are discoverable fro under the bowels of the earth.

The attraction to tangible properties like oil, commonly called the “black gold” in Nigeria has resulted in the neglect of other resources which could compete, if not out-rank oil in terms of wealth generation. Intellectual property rights are resources that Nigerians have neglected or unaware of as a property. It is an intangible property that has generated economic growth and wealth in counties like United States, India, Japan, France and United Kingdom. In the United States, Hollywood has contributed  immensely to the nation’s GDP. In India, Bollywood has contributed greatly to the nations economy. It is the strength of its intellectual property  regime that has propel these entertainment capitals of the world to become economic and cultural model, that most of the world desire to emulate. The copyrights, patent, trademark & publicity rights policies of these countries have been a motivating factor for the economic growth of their entertainment industry.