Nigeria is a nation on the brink of a hunger emergency. With warning signs flashing brightly, the nation appears ill-prepared and disturbingly, unperturbed.
In November, the United Nations estimated that a staggering 33 million Nigerians will face food insecurity in 2025 from 25 million already suffering it.
This looming catastrophe is not just a piece of data, but the grim reality of many households, and therefore a damning indictment and evidence of institutional failure.
Hunger in Nigeria stems from a lethal mix of insecurity, climate change, and mismanagement of the economy- floods have ravaged farmlands, while 15 years of insurgency in the northeast has uprooted lives and livelihoods.
On the other hand, inflation, now in the stratosphere, has turned even basic sustenance into a luxury, and pushed the price of staple food items beyond the reach of ordinary citizens.
For millions of Nigerians, hunger is no longer a metaphor; it’s a daily reality. This paints a grim picture, one of uncertainty in the struggle for survival of many Nigerians.
Over five million people in Borno, Adamawa, and Yobe states are already grappling with acute food insecurity, in the aftermath of prolonged insurgency and terrorist activities.
Emerging hotspots such Zamfara, Katsina, and Sokoto are hurtling toward the same fate. Among the most vulnerable are 5.4 million children and 800,000 pregnant and breastfeeding women, according to the UN.
Out of this figure, 1.8 million children are at risk of Severe Acute Malnutrition, SAM; these are not just figures—they are lives teetering on the edge.
Despite this, Nigeria’s response has been woefully inadequate. The Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs, ostensibly tasked with alleviating such crises, has offered little beyond empty and rhetoric.
Its failure to act decisively exposes a glaring leadership vacuum at a time when action is non-negotiable to stop the ravaging phenomenon.
It is therefore our submission that the ministry must wake up to its responsibility and lead the charge against hunger and poverty in the land through direct person-to-person intervention.
Direct person-to-person interventions—such as immediate cash transfers, distribution of seeds, and fertilizers are critical to stabilizing vulnerable farming communities.
Additionally, the Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs must collaborate with the Ministry of Agriculture and other stakeholders to adopt long-term solutions such as investment in advanced agricultural tools like drones and precision farming to revolutionize food production.
It is also important to build rural infrastructure and fund agricultural research to lay sustainable pathways out of hunger.
The federal government must also strengthen partnerships with international organizations to mobilize resources and expertise.
Nigeria cannot afford to stumble any further. The Minister of Humanitarian Affairs must rise from his slumber and do the job he was assigned to do. It is not enough to lament over crisis; the government must act as if millions of lives depend on it—because they do.
Collaboration between security agencies must be sustained and the very highest level to ensure that all skirmishes and patterns of insecurity are addressed until they are bought to a halt and farming is fully restored in affected areas.
Failure to act decisively would not only deepen the current food crisis but also etch an indelible mark of shame on Nigeria’s history. Posterity will judge the nation harshly if it fails to address a solvable problem such as hunger.
