A new report by the World Bank has warned that the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic is threatening Nigeria’s food security.
The study warns that the effect of the pandemic is threatening to compound Nigeria’s high levels of poverty, noting that even before COVID-19, about 4 out of 10 Nigerians lived below the national poverty line, with multidimensional poverty being even more widespread.
The study is entitled “– COVID-19 in Nigeria: Frontline Data and Pathways for Policy”.
It notes that the lack of social assistance is worsening the impact of the pandemic on Africa’s most populous country.
“Given this lack of social assistance, Nigerian households have been adopting negative coping strategies in response to the shocks that have accompanied the COVID-19 crisis,” said the report,
It reports that the households directly reported feeling the acceleration in prices observed in the macroeconomic data, with about 82 percent of the households reporting that the price of major food items had increased between July 2020 and December 2020.
“The most widespread coping strategy was reducing food consumption: more than two-thirds of shock-hit households reduced their food consumption between April/May 2020 and July 2020,” it said.
This strategy was followed by additional borrowing and drawing down savings, which could place households on weaker financial footing, the study noted.
According to the report, food insecurity unsurprisingly increased when the COVID-19 crisis hit Nigeria, where the first case of the pandemic attack was recorded on February 27, 2020.
“In April/May 2020, at least one adult had skipped a meal (in the previous 30 days) in almost three-quarters of Nigerian households (Figure 3). This share had dropped to about 56 percent by November 2020 but was still significantly higher than what was observed prior to the pandemic,” the study said.
