With a population of about 198 million people, Nigeria is the most populous country on the African continent. The population is growing at an annual rate of 2.6%, while the urban growth rate is 4.3%: today 1 of every 2 Nigerians live in an urban area. Nigeria faces several socio-economic problems – poverty, hunger, unemployment, and the burden of disease – all of which have taken a significant toll on national productivity.
Malnutrition trends over recent years show a worrying lack of progress. Malnutrition statistics indicate severe nutritional gaps occurring during the crucial first 1000-day window of a child’s life and continuing through to early childhood. In parallel with widespread undernutrition, overweight, and obesity are on the rise, especially among adults in urban areas. Consumption of nutritious animal-source foods such as fish has remained static, consumption of vegetables and pulses has declined by 7%, and consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages has increased by 39%. In Nigeria, 5 of the top 10 risk factors that drive disability and death are related to diets. All these gaps in diet quality stemming from insufficient dietary intake, micronutrient deficiencies, and overconsumption point to critical flaws within the national food system.
With a population of about 198 million people, Nigeria is the most populous country on the African continent. The population is growing at an annual rate of 2.6%, while the urban growth rate is 4.3%: today 1 of every 2 Nigerians live in an urban area. © GAIN
Malnutrition represents a serious issue in Nigeria. The statistics for children under five show that 19.9% of children are underweight, 32.0% are stunted, and only 58.2% of children are appropriately breastfed.
The Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition (GAIN) is a Swiss-based foundation launched at the United Nations in 2002 to tackle the human suffering caused by malnutrition. Due to COVID-19, conflict in Ukraine, and climate change, malnutrition and hunger have worsened significantly since 2019, reversing a decade of progress. There is growing recognition that our food systems need to change if we are to reverse these trends. Nigeria is one of the countries impacted by malnutrition.
GAIN’s Strategy aims to transform food systems to make healthier diets from sustainable food systems accessible to all people and especially those who are most vulnerable to shocks. By 2027, we aim to improve the access of 1.5 billion people to nutritionally enhanced staple foods, improve the access of 25 million people to healthier diets, and support positive food system change in 10 countries. This is bold and complex, and the only way to achieve this is to work together with partners including governments, businesses, and civil society at the country and global level.
GAIN’s Strategy aims to transform food systems to make healthier diets from sustainable food systems accessible to all people and especially those who are most vulnerable to shocks. © GAIN
These goals, and the ways of achieving them, build on our twenty-year legacy of transforming people’s lives with improved nutrition through concerted action and effective policy change.
To achieve these objectives, GAIN works in alliances to provide technical, financial, and policy support to the key participants in food systems;
governments, the private sector (including farmers), and consumers to make these systems more nutrition-sensitive.
GAIN has been working in Nigeria since 2012, beginning with Large-Scale Food Fortification, and has since grown to implement more projects
in the country. GAIN’s work in Nigeria is focused on eight areas.
In Nigeria, GAIN has been supporting Large-Scale Food Fortification activities for many years, providing technical support to regulatory agencies and to local food producers and processors to improve the availability of high-quality fortified foods that meet national standards and nutritional needs.
GAIN is supporting federal and state governments to prioritise and put policies in place that embrace a wider variety of on-the ground nutrition interventions.
The Scaling-Up Nutrition Business Network (SBN) was launched in 2016 to improve and strengthen private sector contributions towards improving nutrition by establishing a network of private sector companies in Nigeria with commitments to improve nutrition and supporting their ability to do so with a strong belief that the private sector has a vital role to play in sustainably improving nutrition in the country.
The Evidence and Action Towards Safe, Nutritious Food (EatSafe) work to implement and test a series of interventions to substantially improve food safety, working with vendors and creating consumer demand for safe nutritious foods in informal markets.
This programme is working to create demand for biofortified food crops, especially ProVitamin A maize & Vitamin A cassava, as well as supporting initiatives to commercialise the finished products.
GAIN in partnership with Green Innovation Centre (GIC) of GIZ in Nigeria, is supporting a set of interventions to improve the nutrition and safety of cassava, maize, orange flesh sweet potato, and rice value chains via targeted business support activities, workforce nutrition, as well as increased production and uptake of biofortified crops.
This Programme is being implemented by CARE International and GAIN in Nassarawa, Kebbi, Bauchi and Jigawa states. The Programme goal is to improve food security and contribute to the reduction of malnutrition of at least 5 million women of reproductive age and children under 5.
The programme has two strategic objectives: it aims to increase access to and consumption of healthy diets, as well as increase the resilience of households to economic and climate change-related shocks, with a focus on women of reproductive age and children.
This Project seeks to build on the lessons and progress from GAIN’s recent investments that include creating demand for eggs (The 'Eggs make Kids' Campaign), scaling up support for safe, nutritious food supply to traditional market (KFMW, EatSafe, SBN) through SMEs, Commercialisation of Biofortified Crops (CBC) and reducing postharvest loss (PLAN). The overarching objective is to increase access to and
consumption of nutritious foods at the household levels. The specific goal of ENSAND project is to improve the dietary diversity of low-income households in three states of Nigeria (Kaduna, Kebbi and FCT) with emphasis on children of school age and women.
