The federal government has continued to insist that it is taking necessary actions, even as Nigeria is set to experience a lean food supply crisis from June to August with as many as seven million people would, as predicted, suffer acute hunger and starvation within the period. The 2020 Global Report on Food Crises by the Global Network Against Food Crisis (GNAFC) and the Food Security Information Network (FSIN) made the revelation in a recently released report.
Similarly, the World Food Program disclosed that people with insufficient food consumption globally are 0.99 billion currently. As the world population aggressively moves towards 8 billion (7,789,727,000 around noon on June 7, 2020), more than 10 per cent of the people are suffering from food insufficiency. And, experts have expressed worry that conflicts and climate change may aggravate the tragedy if actions are not urgently taken.
The COVID-19 pandemic and effects of climate change combined, food production, distribution and disposable incomes of the poor around the world have been jeopardized, they said. The WFP report also disclosed that 15 countries are currently with “very high levels of hunger,” indicating that world leaders should be proactive, as conflicts and economic crises could escalate the situation. The GNAFC and FSIN said in Nigeria, “the number of acutely food-insecure people during the June–August 2020 lean season is forecast at 7.1 million, over 40 per cent up from the same period last year.”
The situation poses threats to the actualisation of the global Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) Target 2.1 of “ending hunger and ensuring access by all people, in particular the poor and people in vulnerable situations, including infants, to safe, nutritious and sufficient food all year round.”
Data from HungerMapLIVE, which the WFP has developed to track and predict key aspects of food insecurity every day, highlight key indicators that feed into analyses are the number of people with insufficient food consumption and those employing crisis-level or above coping strategies, among others. The deteriorating situations expected in Nigeria are the result of poor child-feeding practices coupled with seasonal food shortages and increased morbidity in the insurgency-affected states.
In Nigeria, the expected deterioration, it was indicated, is mainly due to the intensification of armed violence in conflict-affected north-eastern areas (Borno, Adamawa and Yobe states and others such as Benue, Kogi and Nasarawa), where tight supplies continue to sustain high food prices and farming is frequently interrupted as herder-farmer/ethnic crises continue. “In these states, around 3.7 million people are expected to be facing a crisis or worse in June–August 2020 – which constitutes a significant increase (23 per cent) compared to the same period in 2019,” the report stated.
At the regional level, the nutrition situation is expected to deteriorate as a result of “the spread of diseases, limited access to food and basic services as well as limited access to humanitarian aid, such as in conflict areas in Burkina Faso, Mali, northern Nigeria and Yemen.” In Chad and Niger republics, due to the seasonal increase in malaria, diarrhoea and respiratory infections around May to September yearly, and constitute the main driving factors of acute malnutrition, the situation is expected to deteriorate in all provinces, according to the WFP report.
Vice-Chancellor of Al-Qalam University and grain production specialist, Prof. Shehu Garki Ado, confirmed that the period June to August is generally referred to as the hunger period. He said, “It is a time when the current year’s products have not been harvested while the previous year’s stock had been exhausted in Nigeria. So, the food insecurity situation will be aggravated by the global pandemic, COVID-19.” The restrictions of movement imposed by the various governments also contribute immensely to the food insecurity situation, Prof. Ado explained, saying, “This is because a lot of people are living below poverty level of say N400 per person payday. The majority of young people depend on menial jobs conducted on a daily basis to earn a living. With the lockdown imposed in the country, those people who earn their bread on a daily basis are facing serious food insecurity challenges.”
The vice-chancellor added that the palliative promised by governments reached only an insignificant number of people from the reports given in print and electronic media. Ado emphasised that food security is an issue of income, either to buy food or to produce one’s own food. And, to avert the food insecurity in Nigeria, the don said, requires sufficient funds to enable food production and also buy food for the urban consumers.
Ado said no country could be truly independent as long as it depends on food imports and “that the first independence is for food; all others can follow. So, self-sufficiency in food production, value addition of what is produced and storage are necessary.” He recommended intensive cultivation of crops and livestock husbandry since the population is increasing at an alarming rate.
Going forward, Vice-Chancellor of the Federal University of Agriculture Abeokuta (FUNAAB), Prof. Felix Kolawole Salako, said the agricultural system must be organised in a better way to make it profitable from the farm to the dining table. This would stimulate favourable responses for investments and financing, and in the long run, food security.
Similarly, the President of Farm and Infrastructures Foundation and Chairman, Voices for Food Security, Prof. G. B. Ayoola, in reaction to the threat, said, “I am afraid, hunger looms! I have a feeling that we are presently [currently] emptying the food store – the grain silos, the yam barns, the thumbs, etc.” He suggested that now is the time to declare a state of emergency on the food sector, “when food is considered as a matter of national security, as Mr. President once put it.”
While stating the preparedness of the Federal Government to prevent hunger and support the vulnerable Nigerians, the Director of Information in the Federal Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development, Mr Theophilus Ogaziechi, said, apart from empowering farmers with free farm inputs, grains and other food items had been released to the Ministry of Humanitarian Services through the Strategic Grain Reserves to cushion the effect of food insufficiency on Nigerians.
