While scrolling through X in 2019, Babatunde Akin-Moses came across a post from a curious individual asking how the recent review of Nigeria’s monetary policy rate (MPR) would affect their daily life.
Akin-Moses, co-founder of burgeoning fintech startup Sycamore and Chief Economic Advisor at Statisense, took a unique approach to explaining this complex economic policy. He explained using a fictional dialogue between a curious young boy and his ‘Uncle Tunde.’
This incident birthed the ‘Uncle Tunde’ series, a periodic set of write-ups where Akin-Moses illustrated real-world economic concepts and their global implications using these conversations.
“During the era of Emefiele as CBN governor, there were a lot of economic policy changes,” Akin-Moses said. “I noticed people were asking a lot of questions online anytime there was a policy change, so I just instinctively sought to answer them.”
Surprisingly, this format became quite popular, with the explainers (mostly written, but sometimes in videos) tagged #JuniorandTunde reaching nearly 70,000 impressions.
The popularity of the Uncle Tunde series over the past five years spurred Akin-Moses to create a comic book that explains 10 economic concepts.
Over a conversation with Akin-Moses, ahead of the book launch, we spoke about why the tech founder is launching a comic book, what’s unusual about the book and what he hopes to achieve.
Let’s go back to the beginning, what drew you to economics?
My story is not the typical one. I was a science student in secondary school on my way to becoming a medical doctor so economics wasn’t even in the plan.
But sometime in 2005, right as I was about to gain admission, I got a call from my dad who suggested I could study economics instead. It was right around the time when Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala had just restructured Nigeria’s Paris debt and then CBN governor Soludo had recapitalised the banking industry.
He just looked at the fact that they were both economists who had a positive impact on society and wanted his son to do the same later on. I didn’t mind, so I just changed course.
Interesting. What was it like studying economics?
Despite not knowing what to expect, I quickly found that I was a good fit. I quickly started to understand how economics impacts everyday life. I thought to myself that there was something here.
While most economics students had a background in commerce, I came from a science background which when combined with my comfort level in mathematics, set me apart. My strong foundation in calculations and economics enabled me to start teaching economic metrics and microeconomics to many classmates from my first year of university.
Hmm. You’ve been teaching for a long time now. I see why it was easy to do that online for years through the Uncle Tunde Series. How did that start?
I wasn’t even in the country at the time, I was just scrolling on X and saw that someone was curious about MPR’s impact on businesses.
I expected that this person was supposed to be knowledgeable since he wrote for a lot of newspapers. But then again I imagined that since he was asking, it meant that a lot more people didn’t know.
With this in mind, I wrote a response, and I kept revising the response to make it simpler before I posted it. The whole idea was to make it easy to understand. And then the post went viral, which gave me a sense that there’s something here again.
Afterwards, I just kept on writing the Uncle Tunde series over the past 4–5 years now— experimenting with video sometimes.
Impressive! And what led to the book?
The book felt like a natural progression. What I did with this book was to simplify complex economic concepts like monetary policy, GDP, and inflation. These foundational principles are timeless, unlike news-driven trends. The book serves as a reliable reference for anyone seeking a basic understanding of economics. It’s written in the form of a comic to make it more accessible, not because it’s only for kids. Anyone can read it.
That’s right. I was halfway through the book when I realised that I had forgotten the difference between Real GDP and Nominal GDP. Thankfully the next chapter explained that.
These things happen. It took me a while to finally get the difference between horizontal and vertical lines etched in my memory. There are many concepts in economics and it’s easy for people to mix them up. So even for people who know these concepts, the book can act as a refresher.
What’s something unusual that you’ve done with this book?
For each chapter, we’ve created a video explainer for the concepts, for those who prefer watching videos over reading. The book includes a scratch card that unlocks access to these videos on the Uncle Tunde website.
Additionally, the website offers free resources to complement your learning. For example, the ‘Economic News Navigator’ PDF provides a list of websites and individuals you can follow for reliable economic news, such as Dr Ola Brown, Kalu Aja, Nairametrics, and more. These resources enhance the value of the book.
It’s a whole experience. You can tap into all these resources on the website. You have something to keep up with the news.
Looking ahead, what do you hope this book will achieve?
I hope that it’ll become a companion for more people who want to understand economic concepts better. There have already been talks about possibly getting it into the Nigerian secondary school curriculum. I didn’t foresee that but we’re happy to explore that route.
All proceeds from the book sales go to the Uncle Tunde Fund, which will support initiatives involved in developing human capital in Nigeria and Africa’s future.
I noticed you covered only 10 economic concepts in this book. Should we be expecting a second volume soon?
Hmmm. Economics is a large subject. I wanted to cover more but for starters chose ten concepts. Let’s see what happens next.
