Nigeria’s statistics office said Wednesday that the country has dropped into recession as its all-important oil industry has suffered under weak global prices.

The country’s gross domestic product (GDP) dropped by 2.06 percent in the second quarter of 2016 after falling 0.36 percent in the previous three months. The technical definition of a recession is two consecutive quarters of negative growth.

An economic adviser to President Muhammadu Buhari, Adeyemi Dipeolu, told the Associated Press that the bleak data was largely attributed to “a sharp contraction in the oil sector due to huge losses of crude oil production,” resulting from vandalism and “sabotage.”

The figures from the country’s National Bureau of Statistics placed estimated oil production at 1.69 million barrels per day, down by 0.42 million barrels per day from the first quarter. Consequently, real growth within the sector was negative 17.48 percent year on year in the second quarter of 2016.

Tony Elumelu, chairman of Heirs Holdings and the United Bank for Africa, said in an interview with CNBC Tuesday that following the fall in the price of commodities, “the government in Nigeria and across Africa … need to diversify their economies.” But, he warned that this process was a gradual one, as “you don’t diversify an economy overnight.”

Reflecting Nigeria’s potential for this diversification, Facebook chief executive Mark Zuckerberg is currently in Nigeria, meeting with technology start-ups and visiting a coding summer camp for children.

According to the GDP report, Nigeria’s non-oil sector was driven by the agriculture, information and communication, water supply, arts, science, education and services sectors, which all saw positive growth. But overall, the non-oil segment of its economy declined by 0.38 percent in real terms in the second quarter of this year.

Elumelu was positive about Buhari’s economic management of the country, commending what he perceived as the current government’s genuine “realization about what the situation is” as well as its “firm commitment and determination to do something and bring change about.” Elumelu also discussed Buhari’s “policy stability” which would enable investors in the country to plan.

With regards to an overarching strategy for the region, Elumelu stressed that “Africa needs private global capital to come in,” and that “what is good for the private sector is good for society.” He viewed such investment as enabling countries to create employment, address the issues of inequality and poverty, and “engender inclusive growth.” Elumelu asserted: “this is the solution to the difficult economic times everyone is going through.”

Africa’s largest economy, Nigeria, has officially entered recession after two consecutive quarters of contraction. Gross domestic product shrank by 2.06% in the second quarter of 2016, following a 0.36% shrinking in the first quarter, according to data released by the country’s National Bureau of Statistics on Wednesday.

Those two consecutive quarters of economic shrinkage mean the country is in its first recession in more than 20 years. Recession in Nigeria may be an unwelcome development, but it is not unexpected. Earlier in the year, Godwin Emefiele, the governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria, warned “recession was imminent,” the Financial Times reports.

“We have long warned of a slow-burning crisis in Nigeria,” Capital Economics’ Africa economist, John Ashbourne, said in May. “It now seems that this view was too optimistic: The country is headed into a full-blown economic crisis.” The International Monetary Fund has also warned on the state of the country’s economy, forecasting that growth will shrink by 1.8% in 2016.

The big driver of the slump in the Nigerian economy, which was one of Africa’s great success stories until recently, has been the persistently low price of oil over the past 2 1/2 years. Nigeria relies heavily on oil and is the largest producer of the commodity on the continent, producing roughly 2.4 million barrels a day. Given that oil’s price has slumped from more than $100 a barrel in 2014 to roughly $48 now, it is perhaps unsurprising that the country has struggled to find economic growth.

The Nigerian oil industry’s problems have been made even worse by a series of major disruptions in the oil-rich Niger Delta area, caused largely by a militant group calling itself the Niger Delta Avengers. Most notably, the group attacked a Chevron offshore facility in May and the underwater Forcados export pipeline operated by Shell in late March. The production disruptions caused by these attacks and others have wreaked havoc with the already stricken industry.

Growth in non-oil sectors of the country’s economy has also been badly hit, as Business Insider’s Elena Holodny wrote in May, with manufacturing taking the biggest hit. Non-oil GDP contracted by 0.38% in Q2, according to a tweet by Kale. The country’s decision to unpeg the naira against the dollar does not appear to have led to a hoped-for influx of dollar investment. Instead the government is now dealing with inflation.

“This is very bad news for Nigeria’s government, which has justified the current FX system as a method of promoting non-oil industries,” Ashbourne of Capital Economics said. “It is now clear that these policies have — as we’d long argued — made a bad situation worse.” While things look pretty bleak for the economy, research from Barclays circulated to clients on Wednesday argues that the worst of Nigeria’s crisis may be over.

“Economic activity in Q3 16 continues to be hampered by security concerns in the Niger Delta, ongoing FX shortages, rising inflation and significantly tighter monetary policy. That said, the decision by militants to stop attacks, the implementation of the 2016 budget and better availability of FX, despite it remaining a massive constraint, suggests a marginally better outlook for H2,” Ridle Markus argued in Barclays’ “Sub-Saharan Africa Daily” note.

Markus did say, however, that “for the year as a whole, we fear that the economy is set to contract, which will be the first full-year recession since 1991.”