Nigerians paid more on food commodities last month on account of President Muhammadu Buhari’s directive to have the country’s borders partially closed which consequently stoked food prices.
Average prices of most consumed food items by the country’s populace rose by 1.64 percent to N591.15 in August from a 30-month low of N585.71 in July, even as 31 of 43 food items recorded uptick last month, according to data by National Bureau of Statistics.
“The border closure has made people hoard food items thereby causing food scarcity,” said Mogaji African Farmer, Head of Agriculture & Agro-Allied Group at Lagos Chamber of Commerce & Industry.
“Since the customs closed the border, people have taken laws into their hands by increasing their prices of food items because there is no association that regulates food prices.” he noted.
About 80 percent of analysts polled by BusinessDay cited border closure, not seasonlity, as the chief cause of higher food prices in August.
On a month on month basis, the average price of an agric egg medium-sized rose by 5.7 percent to N40.6 in August from N38.4 in the previous month, the average price of a bottle of groundnut oil rose by 2.3 percent to N557.4 from N545.3, chicken wings and feet rose by 1.68 percent and 3.34 percent respectively.
The cost of gari yellow, sold loose increased by 8.62, ripped plantain increase by 3.60, and yam tuber increased by 11.2 percent.
Furthermore, the average price of a dried fish sardine increases by 0.47 to N1, 373.1 in August. For onion bulb, it rose by 6.5 to N206.0 from N193.5 and tomato (1kg) increase month-on-month by 9.9 percent.
“The restriction from the borders has pushed prices up. Food items like apples, tomatoes, chicken, fish, pineapples, turkey, rice, palm oil, etc are imported through the Benin border,” Aboidun Olorundenro, Operations Manager, Aquashoots Nigeria said.
Earlier last month, President Muhammadu Buhari had announced the closure of the border, saying that it would avert Nigeria from being a dumping ground for imported products, and would also boost patronage of locally made products.
The directive was announced towards the end of August, making it somehow ineffectual to affect commodities prices as Nigeria’s annual inflation decelerated for the third consecutive month to print at 11.02 percent in August compared with 11.02 percent in July. Food inflation hit a 12-month low of 13.17 percent in August.
The country’s statistics office said moderation in inflation was driven by favourable harvest and weak consumer demand but analysts say inflationary expectation is relatively high given the border closure and foreign exchange restriction on food item and headline inflation might climb higher in September.
“The government has done their part but the associations should come in and control the prices that they can be consistent and get more local investors to play in that space if not consumers will continue to be taken advantage off,” Mogaji said.
BUNMI BAILEY
