Nigeria: The price of tomatoes has surged by 321% in one year, as have other food items

Food prices have continued to increase as Nigeria's headline inflation hit 34.19% in June 2024, one of the highest globally.

NBS's monthly survey for the average prices of selected food items in Nigeria as of June 2024 shows that tomatoes have gone up by 321%, yam by 296%, and staples — beans, rice, and plantain — have also seen significant increases. These are the top ten food items most hit by inflation in Nigeria in the past twelve months.

Source:

National Bureau of Statistics

Period:

June 2024
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The basket of food that cost ₦100k in January 2025 cost approximately ₦114k in August
  • Food prices rose roughly 13.9% from January to August 2025, according to the rebased Consumer Price Index (CPI) from the National Bureau of Statistics.
  • Month-on-month inflation for food fluctuated, with some months seeing sharper increases than others.
  • Using January as a baseline, the purchasing power of money for food declined steadily, meaning households need more naira to buy the same items.
  • Food carries a large weight in the CPI basket, making it a major driver of overall inflation and cost-of-living increases.
Nigeria recorded the lowest score on food affordability in the 2022 global food security index, with 25 points
  • Among the 113 countries measured in the 2022 Global Food Security Index, Nigeria is ranked 107th overall, putting it deep in the bottom ten globally.
  • Nigeria has the lowest affordability score globally in the GFSI 2022, scoring only 25.0 in that pillar.
  • The country performs marginally better in other pillars: its score in “Quality and Safety” is relatively higher (55.6), and “Sustainability and Adaptation” is 53.7. But other pillars like “Availability” (39.5) remain weak.
  • Globally, a group of countries, including Nigeria, DR Congo, Sudan, Venezuela, Burundi, Madagascar, Sierra Leone, Yemen, Haiti, and Syria, all cluster at low overall GFSI scores (below ~45), reflecting severe challenges.
Nigeria had the highest number of malnourished people in Africa in 2023, with 45.4 million
  • In Africa, 275 million people were recorded to be malnourished in 2023.
  • Nigeria led the list of countries in Africa with the highest number of malnourished people (45.40 million), making 16.5% of the total.
  • Nigeria was followed by the Democratic Republic of Congo with 40.7 million, 14.8% of the total.
  • Nigeria, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia and Kenya made up almost 50% of the total number of malnourished people in Africa.
793 Million people in India could not afford a healthy diet in 2022, representing 28% of the global total
  • India tops the list of the global number of people unable to afford a decent meal with a value of 792.80 million causing unaffordability to prevail in the country by 55.6%.
  • China emerged as the second country in this global list with 208.10 million people falling in this category and unaffordability prevalence of 14.6%.
  • Nigeria claimed 6.2% of the global total with 175.6M, making it the 3rd country with the highest number of healthy diet unaffordability.
  • High number of people that could not afford a healthy diet does not outrightly equal high percentage of healthy diet unaffordability.
South Sudan tops Africa's food inflation list with 106%; two other East African nations in top 5
  • South Sudan and Zimbabwe have crossed 100% food inflation.
  • Three of the top five countries with the highest food inflation in Africa are in East Africa, showing a regional pattern of vulnerability.
  • Nigeria ranks 7th in Africa for food inflation at 21.3%, underlining persistent cost-of-living pressures despite being a major economy.
  • Liberia and Zambia round out the top 10 with double-digit food inflation.
  • Djibouti, Somalia, and Senegal are experiencing food price deflation, setting them apart from most African countries.
In January 2025, the food inflation rate dropped to 26.08% from 39.84% in December 2024
Key takeaways:
  • The inflation rate experienced a growth rate of 60.5% from May 2023 to December 2024.
  • The May 2024 food inflation rate grew by 15.84% points higher than May 2023 levels.
  • The most significant monthly increase occurred in February 2024, when food inflation rose by 2.51% from January 2024.
  • Brief periods of relief were observed in July, August, and December 2024, when the rates showed slight declines.
  • The food inflation rate dropped by 13.76% between December 2024 and January 2025 due to CPI rebasing to 2024 from 2009.
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