Exposing the Rural Insecurity behind Nigeria’s Food Crisis

Jan 25, 2026 | Lekan Olayiwola
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Nigeria’s food crisis is often described in the language of numbers: inflation rates, tonnage of grains lost, millions displaced, and millions hungry. These figures matter, but they obscure a deeper truth that is now impossible to ignore. Nigeria’s food insecurity is inseparable from its peace deficit.

Not peace understood narrowly as the absence of war, but peace as the presence of functioning rural systems, including security, markets, trust, and governance that allow food to move from soil to table. It is time to rethink priorities, align food policy with peacebuilding, and to address blindspots that well-intentioned strategies have left untouched.