1.0 Introduction
1.1 Motivation and Statement of Problem
Over the years, the Nigerian economy had not always been in a steady state as a result of the unsteady oil prices in the world market. An article written by Tunde (1986) on petroleum profit tax in Nigeria emphasized that the situation is really pitiable since the country depends solely on oil as her major foreign earner. Moreover, there had been a decline in agricultural produce, which makes the situation worse.
This decline in agricultural produce invariably crippled food supply, hence making it difficult for the nation to fend for her citizenry. According to ikoku(1980) “one solution to the problem of hunger is for the hungry to produce the food themselves”. But the country failed to work in this direction, due to misappropriation and poor implementation of developmental policies and programme in the agricultural sector.
According to Adamu(1999) “since the early 70's various regimes that had ruled the country attempted to address the nations food supply problem by instituting different programmes that yielded no success” This economic decadence undoubtedly imposes untold hardship on the citizenry. In line with this, Ikoku (1980) maintained that the most outstanding feature for man's survival from the time of his creation has been his unceasing quest to have enough to eat but, ironically it is this goal that has eluded him most.
In view of this, the Nigerian situation is really pitiable. The excruciating economic downturn now forced people, particularly the fixed income earners to live from hand to mouth. People with large family size now find it difficult to maintain their regular feeding formula, irrespective of the nutritive composition of the food items. People had been prone to disease because of malnutrition. In addition to disease incidence, there had been increase in crime wave, prostitution and sorts of social menace.
In attempt to salvage this economic situation, the federal government in collaboration with various international and local organizations instituted some policies and programmes. These programmes, among others were: the Structural Adjustment programme (SAP), operation feed the nation (OFN), the Green Revolution National Family Planning Programme and recently introduced PTF fund's food supply project etc the acceleration fertility regulation and family planning programmes were instituted in view of the increasing incident of unwanted pregnancies, abortions abandoned babies and child abuse which constituted a national social problem.
Despite all government effort in bringing policies and programmes in place, in order to achieve their targeted aims and objectives, little or none of their impact had been felt by citizenry. Adamu (1999) maintain that government's policies and programmes often failed because of their ill implementation. Structural Adjustment Programme (SAP), which was an inward looking, intuitive, economic transformer and self-depending economic models, according to Ezeaku(1993), was not implemented. He further stated that the resultant effect of it was an untold hardship on fixed income earners particularly those in civil service.
The escalating food prices were beyond the reach of workers. All government efforts in price control proved futile workers in various government establishments decided embarking on strike action, to press for salary increment, in order to keep pace with inflation on food prices. This was attested from the household survey inducted by federal office of statistics from July-September in 1996 in overall expenditure pattern of households.
They arrived at the conclusion that the urban dwellers surfer most from the incessant increase in food prices, followed by the semi urban settlers, and that the rural dwellers were least affected. In light of the above findings the researchers therefore deemed it necessary to carryout a survey of the staff of Imo state university Owerri.
This survey will help generate the behaviour of some factors, which affect the standard of living of average urban dwellers in Nigeria. This was in view of the fact that the university is situated in the urban area. These factors as mentioned earlier are; household size and house hold income. Emphasis will also be placed on relationship with household monthly food expenditure.
Food according to Britannica encyclopedia is that material consisting essentially of protein, carbohydrate and fat used in the body of an organism to sustain growth, repair and furnish energy from the above description on food relevance and importance in the proper functioning human body, one can see that it is material we cannot do without. But regrettably, many people had been denied access to good feeding either because of personal factors or because of the collective problem of the society. in line with this, Emeka, Bello and Olayide(1980) suggested that the government of Nigeria should make it a policy to improve the national diet to substantially raise the calorie and protein in-take of her citizens, therefore, I am of the view that this survey will contribute immensely towards solving both economic and social problems of this group of workers through useful discoveries.
1.2 Aims and Objectives
The major aims and objectives of this study are;
- To adequately establish a model for the relationship between monthly expenditure on food, household size by the use of simple and multiple linear regression.
- To establish the simple correlation between;
- Household monthly expenditure on food and monthly income
- Household monthly expenditure on food and household size
- To estimate the various partial correlation coefficients.
1.3 Research Questions
- Does household monthly income and household size have any significant effect in predicting household monthly food expenditure?
- Does household monthly income only, has any significant influence in determining household monthly food expenditure?
- Does household size have any significant effect on household monthly food expenditure?
- Is there any significant degree of relationship between each explanatory variable with the amount of monthly food expenditure?
- Is there any significant strength of relationship between household monthly food expenditure and household monthly income after controlling the effect of household size?
- Is there any significant relationship between household monthly food expenditure and household size at fixed monthly income?
1.4 Statement of Hypothesis
The following hypothesis will be tested:
- That household monthly income and household size have no significant effect in predicting household monthly food expenditure.
- That household monthly income only has no significant influence in determining household monthly food expenditure.
- That household size has no significant effect on household monthly food expenditure
- That there is no significant degree of relationship between each explanatory variable with the amount of monthly expenditure.
- That there is no significant strength of relationship between household monthly food expenditure and household monthly income after controlling the effect of household size.
- That there is no significant relationship between household monthly food expenditure and household size at fixed monthly income.
1.5 Significance of the Study
This statistical survey will help in providing a comparative alternative for decision makers particularly in search for comprehensive policies and programmes, if the contents are adequately understood. Since the survey is aimed at identifying the overall relationship between income and expenditure on food among Staff of Imo State University, it will probably help to provide fair judgment on their standard of living. However, this will also relate the expenditure made on food to expenditure committed to other area of life, in view of the proportion of food expenditure to their disposable income.
However, this survey is planned in a manner that data obtained from it could be useful in our estimate of the relationship among various variables. Finally, it is my hope that the survey would provide basic social information about the living standard of Imo State University Staff.
1.6 Nature and Scope of Study
This statistical survey was designed to cover the households of the Staff of Imo State University. These staff was grouped as Academic Staff, Senior Administrative Staff, Junior Administrative Staff and Contract Staff.
1.7 Definition of Terms
To throw more light and clarity on certain concepts the researcher deems it appropriate at this point to define some of the common terms used:
Consumer:
A person who buys goods or uses services.
Expenditure:
This is act of using or spending money.
Food:
These are things that people.
Household:
All people living together in a house.
Income:
Money that a person earns for work or investment.
