AN AFRICAN JOURNAL OF HUMANITIES, LIVEWAYS, AND HERITAGE STUDIES

Rural-urban migration has been a defining feature of Nigeria's development trend since the 1970s oil boom, intensifying due to poverty, unemployment, insecurity, and the neglect of rural areas. While extant literature largely frames migration as a zero-sum problem of rural loss and urban congestion, this paper adopts a philosophy of reciprocal dependence to examine the impact of rural-urban migration on economic development in Nigeria. Using qualitative analysis of secondary data, the paper assesses how migration shapes national economic stability. The findings reveal that migration contributes to economic development through five key channels: labour supply for urban markets, remittances that sustain rural households, skills and knowledge transfers, and market expansion for rural producers. The paper further identifies the absence of social infrastructure and deliberate state neglect as the primary drivers of migration, creating a 'developmental push' that compels movement rather than choices. The critical gap this paper fills is the lack of scholarship on rural-urban migration as a system of mutual economic survival. Most studies ask how migration harms either rural or urban areas. This paper instead asks: can rural and urban Nigeria economically survive without each other? In response, it proposes the 'Dual Survival Model,' which positions rural-urban linkages as the foundation of national stability. The paper recommends a paradigm shift from migration control to migration management through rural-urban synergy. This entails large-scale investment in rural infrastructure, including roads, electricity, healthcare, education, communication, security, andagro-processing facilities. Such investment will strengthen the rural-urban economic corridors, integrate value chains, and transform migration from a distress response into a choice, thereby fostering inclusive and balanced economic growth.

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