People sometimes believe that the availability of food is luxury or a privilege rather than a basic human right. Scarcity of food in most underdeveloped countries is more like a routine these days. Talking about food security in Nigeria, not only in Nigeria but also around the world, every country leader owe its citizen a need to be in a state of having a reliable access to a sufficient quantity of affordable and nutritious food to avoid stages where some people would have to be involved into malicious, illegal and traumatic acts just to get that morsel or spoonful into their mouths.
At the global level, demographic and economic growth have challenged the limits of all levels of sustainability, giving rise to questions about food security. It has been estimated that about 35 000 people around the world die from hunger. As shocking as this might sound, even well civilized countries like Canada sometimes depend on food banks and in the United States, about 30 million people are unable to buy enough food to sustain their health.
The concept of Food Security
Food Security is not really a popular term, some people have no idea what the term means. However, food security can be defined as the situation that exists when people, at all times, have social, physical and economic access to sufficient food, nutritious and safe food that meets their dietary needs and food preferences for a healthy and active life. According to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), ” it also means that food is available at all times; that all person’s have means of access to it; that is is nutritionally adequate in terms of quantity, quality and variety; and that it is acceptable within the given culture. Only when all these conditions are in a place can a population be perceived as “food secure”. Judging from the elaborate definition of food security, one might say it is almost impossible to attain food security in a given populace. The four most distinctive key components for food security are;
Availability; This simply means providing sufficient amount of food to people at a given time and in a given place.
Accessibility: That there is equal access to get food notwithstanding if you are an elite, a socialist or a regular citizen of a given country. There should be no such thing as inequality as regards getting something as important as food.
Acceptability: This dimension narrows whether information and food system innovations will be accepted in a country giving respect to the citizens ecological and social concerns.
Adequacy: Adequate measures need to be put in place to ensure that food is sustained at all levels of either production/manufacture, transportation and distribution, consumption, storage and waste management. This is where the quality of food is placed on the spotlight, the selling and consumption of expired or unhealthy foods can have severe detrimental effects to humans.
Food Security in Nigeria
Earlier, we highlighted that some underdeveloped countries go through various lengths just to get access to food, let’s talk about the food security situation in Nigeria. Nigeria, a country located in the West side of Africa is a developing country with one of the largest populations in the globe. For a country with so much people living in it, it is expected that there is scarcity or insufficiency of food.
Nigeria is endowed with so many natural and human resources but has ignored or paid less attention to her agricultural and sub-crops sector giving rise to unavailability of food, hike in food prices and over scarcity of basic raw food materials for production of edibles. earthlydiets.com/nine-things-you-should-not-do-on-an-empty-stomach/
Nigeria however, still has the potential to be food secure if some strategies are implemented effectively these strategies include; rural development, adequate funding and budgetary allocations to Agriculture especially, the sub-crop sectors, easy access to basic farm inputs, education for peasant farmers and enunciation of appropriate policies for food crop sub-sector with political stability.
Importance of Food Security in Nigeria
The importance of food security in Nigeria cannot be overstressed because everyone needs food both for survival and body nourishment. However, the three major aim of food security is to;
1. Ensure production of adequate food supplies
2. Maximise stability in the flow of supplies
3. Ensure access to available supplies especially, on the part of those who need them the most.
With the implementation of food security, everyone easily have access to food and can live a very healthy life.
Improving Food Security on a Global scale
According to population growth and global rising incomes, it is estimated that the demand for food will rise by 70 to 100 percent by 2050 and to meet this need, production in developing countries will need to almost double their efforts. Increasing productivity, improving market and trade then building local capacity by training small farmers, completing assessments on climate change and increasing agricultural yields.
Individually, we have a lot to do which can also improve food security in our locales and society at large. Here are some of the things we can do individually;
1. Planting a small garden or practicing mini farming
2. Organizing a farmer’s market
3. Embarking on community food projects and distributing food locally while building and creating relationships.
4. Making healthy food available at fair prices
5. Practicing safe food storage and avoiding food wastage.
6. Giving out surplus food and edibles to people in need.
If the above can be carried out by both the government and us, the level of food insecurity will be drastically reduced and the availability of good food will also be ensured.
Impact of Food security on our health
Food is vital for a healthy life, humans have been channeled to crave and need food for growth and development. We become hungry on a daily basis and aside religious and cultural reasons, we need to satisfy those cravings. Food insecurity mostly occurs due to poverty, increased population and ignorance. When food is insecure, the following happens;
- Malnutrition which can also cause death
- Accumulation of diseases and sicknesses
- Hunger and stomach aches
- Low birth weight
- Impaired cognitive ability
- Reduced life expectancy
- Growth failure
- Reduced capacity to learn
- Delay in maturation
During the pandemic, more people died quicker from hunger than Covid in some parts of Africa and other developing countries because there was no access to good food. The most vulnerable population to food insecurity are the children, hunger matter more to these folks which is why the issue of unavailability of food should be closely mirrored worldwide. Research shows that children who have experienced a lack of food during one time or period are are likely to experience poor health a decade later.
While ensuring food security, an important piece to also bring into the limelight is food safety. We do not want to be going around eating contaminated foods, do we? The intake of contaminated foods can cause almost twice the effect that hunger can cause. Food security and food safety work hand in hand because while the former makes accessibility of food easier, the later stresses the need to eat food that is free from contamination.
How we can ensure Food Security in Nigeria
To sustain food security, we need to implement some approaches which include;
- Limiting food losses and waste
- Eating more plant based foods
- Recycling of foodstuffs
- Reusing or reprocessing surplus foods
- Recover the energy as biofuels, nutrients as compost and raw materials for industry.
Conclusion
Just as water is a vital part of our lives, the same goes with food. Infact, these two basic components of life work hand in hand to fuel growth, nutrition and good health. If you think food is not as important, try drinking water for days or while your stomach churn from excruciating hunger. We should also try to eat as at when required to avoid the desperation that comes with becoming extremely hunger which can consequently make us eat unhealthy and contaminated foods. Food security in Nigeria and globally needs to be addressed as soon as possible.
Moreso, the government cannot create food security alone hence, all hands must be on deck to actualize this, it all begins with YOU!