Six months after the Nigerian government promised to address soaring food prices, citizens have yet to witness the results of this intervention. DAILY POST recalls that in July 2024, the government introduced what it termed strategic measures to tackle the issue. The Minister of Agriculture and Food Security, Abubakar Kyari, announced these plans on his verified X account last July. Kyari mentioned that the initiatives were set to be executed over the following 180 days, with the goal of reducing high food costs. He detailed that the measures included a 150-day Duty-Free import window for food products, along with the suspension of duties, tariffs, and taxes on imports of certain food items such as maize, husked brown rice, wheat, and cowpea, across both land and sea borders. “Our administration has launched a variety of strategic initiatives designed to tackle the rising food prices impacting our nation,” he stated. These measures will take effect within the next 180 days. They include a 150-day period during which food commodities can be imported duty-free, as well as the suspension of duties, tariffs, and taxes for importing certain food items via land and sea borders. The Minister mentioned that the commodities consist of maize, husked brown rice, wheat, and cowpea. DAILY POST reported that the countdown of 180 days starting on July 10, 2024, concluded on Tuesday, January 20, 2024. Before the Minister’s announcement, DAILY POST highlighted that the increase in prices of garri, yam, and other food items had driven Nigeria’s food inflation to 40.87 percent in June 2024, up from 40.66 percent in May. The National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) revealed in its Consumer Price Index and Inflation report that food inflation in Nigeria rose by 15.62 percentage points compared to June 2023, which had a rate of 25.25 percent. The report indicated that increased prices of whole grains such as millet, garri, guinea corn, yam, water yam, groundnut oil, palm oil, and fish contributed to this annual hike. A comparative analysis of the NBS’s Consumer Price Index report showed that in July 2024, the food inflation rate was 39.53 percent on a year-on-year basis, marking an increase of 15.03 percentage points from July 2023, which was 26.98 percent. In August of the same year, the NBS Consumer Price Index report indicated that food inflation dropped to 22.025 percent from 22.024 percent in July. The NBS attributed this decrease to falling prices of tobacco, tea, cocoa, coffee, groundnut oil, milk, yam, Irish potatoes, water yam, cassava tuber, palm oil, and vegetables. Nonetheless, according to the NBS, the food inflation rate in September was 22.025 percent. Nigerians are experiencing hunger, which is evident from the stampedes in Ibadan, Anambra, and Abuja, areas that are relatively well-off in the country. This raises concern about the situation in other states where prosperity may not be as strong as in Abuja, Ibadan, or Anambra. The reality is that our situation is extremely serious. Nigeria is struggling and находится на дне. The food security index is based on four criteria, and Nigeria is struggling significantly in two of them, ranking among the lowest globally. The first is food availability, and the second is food affordability, where Nigeria stands as the worst in the world. The issue of food security isn’t new, but it is worsening. Previously, under the last government, there was an initiative to encourage all Nigerians to engage in farming. I don’t know of any place on earth that has successfully tackled food insecurity by encouraging everyone to become a farmer; it’s just avoiding the issue. What is missing is the fact that we have not automated and updated agriculture in Nigeria. “In the 2025 budget, agriculture was not given the attention it requires.”
