15m children face hunger over high food prices, says report

REPORT released yesterday by an international child rights group, Save the Children, indicated that about 15.6 million children in Nigeria faced hunger as the lean season starts in June. According to the new analysis by Save the Children, the number of hungry children is 25 per cent higher than in the same period in 2023, and is likely the result of increasing insecurity, protracted conflict, banditry and rising food prices in the West African country. It also represents one out of six children in Nigeria.

According to the analysis of figures released by Cadre Harmonisé, a regional framework to identify food and nutrition insecurity in the Sahel and West Africa, almost 32 million people in Nigeria, including 15.6 million children, will face crisis levels of hunger between June and August unless food and cash assistance are received.

While these months between harvests are when hunger typically peaks in Nigeria, a quarter more children are set to go hungry compared to 2023.

This suggests that over 3.4 million additional children, on average 9,000 a day, have been plunged into hunger in the last year.

The report also indicated that violent killings, attacks and kidnappings by nonstate armed groups and bandits in the country’s north have affected food production, disrupted local markets and caused farmers to flee their farms.

According to the Association of Nigerian Farmers, so far this year, no fewer than 165 farmers across Nigeria have been killed, mostly in Benue in the country’s north- central region, which the United Nations ( UN) has said is an emerging hotspot for farmer and herder conflicts.

Save the Children’s Country Director for Nigeria, Duncan Harvey, said: “An already dire hunger situation in the country is gradually going from bad to worse as violence, insecurity and rising prices combine to leave over 15 million children hungry in Nigeria.

“Hunger exists nationwide, but the situation in the north where violence is rife is particularly dire. In Borno, Yobe, Katsina and Zamfara, one in three children do not know where their next meal will come from. “