The new minimum wage recently approved by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu and passed by the National Assembly, the bill of which has also been signed into law by the President, may fail to meet the needs of the Nigerian worker as food prices have continued to soar in Nigeria.

Many families are currently struggling to put a decent meal on the table.

Today, prices of yam, beans, eggs, garri, rice and other food items have been soaring relentlessly pushing many below the poverty line.

A market survey by BDSunday shows that a sizeable tuber of yam goes for between N5,000 and N10,000; a derica and paint bucket of beans go for N2,000 and N12,000; one egg and a crate of eggs go for N200 and N5,500 and paint bucket of rice sells for as much as N8,000.

A paint bucket of garri sells for N4,000 while 5kg goes between N8,500 and N9,500 while 10kg of semolina sells for N17,000 and N19,000.

BDSunday also discovered that prices of condiments for stew and soup have also gone up as a derica and paint bucket of egusi now sells for N1,500 and N8,000; ogbono sells for N6,000 per derica and N30,000 per paint bucket; a paint bucket of fresh tomatoes sells for N10,000; a kilo of stockfish now goes for N8,000 while prices of pepper and ginger have also gone up.

With the prices of foodstuffs skyrocketing daily, Nigerians skip meals while others eat less balanced diets to meet the economic pressure.

“I nearly fainted when a yam seller told me that a tuber of a sizeable new yam was N10,000. It is not easy to buy yam these days. Old and new yams are very expansive, which means that there is no respite from any angle as far as buying food items is concerned,” said Ayorinde Babatope, a Nigerian worker.

According to Babatope, his family of six would manage to eat N10,000 tuber of yam as a meal and will need double tuber if it is the one that sells for N4,000 each.

“What is happening in Nigeria is unimaginable because my wife likes to eat yam and she recently bought a small tuber of old yam for N4,800 but half of that yam was spoilt and, in the end, it was only my wife who ate the remaining,” he said.

Monica Ezechi, a businesswoman, said she recently bought four tubers of small-sized old yam for N25,000.

She said prices are scaring people away from buying yam for pottage, frying and most importantly preparing pounded yam.

She said her husband recently went to Mile 12 in Lagos to buy yam only for the seller to tell him that a tuber sells for N10,000 and the man ended up leaving the market without being able to buy one tuber.

Rising food inflation soars

Nigeria is battling the worst inflation rate as prices of food items continue to climb up pushing families into hard times.

While the cost of food items continues to rise, people’s salaries remain the same as many employers of labour struggle to keep their heads above troubled waters due to the surging inflation and find it difficult to increase their wage bill by raising workers’ salaries.

According to the National Bureau of Statistics, inflation fastened to 34.19 percent in June 2024 from 33.95 percent in May 2024, for the 18th consecutive month.

On a year-on-year basis, the headline inflation rate was 11.40 percent points higher compared to the rate recorded in June 2023, which was 22.79 percent.

On a month-on-month basis, the headline inflation rate in June 2024 was 2.31 percent, which was 0.17 percent higher than the rate recorded in May 2024.

The food inflation rate in June 2024 rose 40.87 percent on a year-on-year basis, which was 15.62 percent points higher compared to 25.25 percent recorded in June 2023.

Cost of Jollof rice 19.6%

BusinessDay reports that the average cost of preparing a pot of jollof rice for a Nigerian family of five rose by 19.6 percent within four months due to a spike in tomatoes and pepper prices, according to a new Jollof Index report.

The SBM Intelligence report shows the cost of preparing a pot of the popular Nigerian delicacy increased to N20,274 in June 2024 from N16,955 in March.

This means that a family of five that earned the old monthly minimum wage of N30,000 ($18.6) per month before it was increased to N70,000 ($43.5), would have spent 67.6 percent of the pay to cook a pot of Jollof. But with the new wage, a pot of Jollof could take 28.9 percent. Further

“The surge in cost of Jollof rice was primarily driven by substantial price hikes in key ingredients, particularly tomatoes and peppers. Other essential components such as rice, turkey, beef and vegetable oil maintained their already high prices, further contributing to the overall cost increase,” the report said.

More Nigerians live below the poverty line

A total of 70.7 million people representing 31 percent of Nigeria’s over 225. 7 million population are now living in extreme poverty, according to the World Poverty Clock.

World Poverty Clock, which puts conditions of people living below the poverty threshold at $2.15 about N3,460, revealed that about 62.8 million poor Nigerians representing 89 percent of the nation’s population live in rural areas while 11 percent representing 7.9 million people live in urban areas.

How it started

Nigerians started battling surging food prices in June 2023 after President Bola Tinubu removed the controversial petrol subsidy, causing petrol pump prices to spike from N195/litre to the current price of between N590 and N780 per litre depending on location and marketer.

Tinubu’s administration also floated the naira through its forex liberalisation policy which ended up battering the value of the currency and pushing it to N1,609.29 per dollar at the Nigerian autonomous foreign exchange market (NAFEM) as of Friday, July 26.

Youths protest economic hardship

Nigerian youths last Thursday and Friday took to the streets to protest against economic hardship. Many Nigerians cannot afford food as Africa’s most populous nation battles the worst cost-of-living crisis.

Despite the approval of the N70,000 minimum wage by President Tinubu, Nigerians have argued that the new minimum wage may not be enough to feed a household of three.

BusinessDay calculations show that the new minimum wage represents a 133.3 percent rise from N30,000 since 2019. Still, it cannot provide food for an average Nigerian family of three for one month.

Meanwhile, the Federal Government has rolled out some palliative measures such as the distribution of truckloads of food to the state, approving the importation of paddy rice, approving a 150-day duty-free import window for food commodities and rolling out student loans, but none has been able to ameliorate the plight of the people.

“The government’s palliative has not changed anything for the people because Nigerians are now more vulnerable than ever. This palliative thing is meaningless because it hasn’t made any impact,” said Joseph Aremu, a retiree.

Aremu said the food items that were in the palliative bags given to him and other beneficiaries could barely feed his family for one week.

People’s survival mechanisms

A report shows that many Nigerians who could not afford a tuber of yam now resort to buying yam in pieces, a new trend in Nigeria.

To mitigate the soaring prices of foodstuff, many people in the urban centres are now putting their space into use by imbibing in subsistence farming.

“I will be harvesting over 20 tubers of yams from the seeds that I planted in bags in our backyard. This will be a serious reprieve to the huge amount we spend on food monthly. Food prices are costly, and one needs to do something to help the family,” said Fabian Godspower, a Lagos-based educationist.

He further said that having concrete floors is no longer an excuse for people not to have gardens as such a problem could be solved by planting in bags or old plastic containers. (BusinessDay)

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