Floods, food shortages threaten to make Nigeria vulnerable to the food crisis

Nigeria was growing rice paddy until this month but now it is like thousands of hectares of rice in Nigeria’s Kebbi State, it is underwater. Kebbi state was expecting to harvest two million tonnes of rice paddy but floods this month have destroyed almost 90 per cent of the harvest. These were expected to be harvested this autumn season as told by the head of the state branch of the Rice Farmers Association of Nigeria. 

The loss amounts to some 20 per cent of the rice Nigeria grew last year, and the waters are still rising.  Chicken feed prices have more than doubled. Some farmers and economists said it could push Nigeria, Africa’s most populous nation, into a food crisis. Rice is the country’s staple grain, and chicken is a core protein. 

Data source: Al Jazeera