1.1 Introduction
Food insecurity is described as a state where everyone lacks enough food to live a healthy and productive life as a result of banditry and herdsmen attacks. Food is a necessity for humans. Man is thought to be incomplete without nourishment. According to Balogun (2017), food has definite values that make it necessary to man. Food has biological, social, economic, and political implications for humans. During the 1974 World Food Conference, the term food security was coined to emphasize supply. Food security is thus defined as the availability of sufficient world food supply of fundamental commodities at all times to enable stable growth in food consumption while offsetting the volatility in production and pricing (United Nations Agriculture Agency, 2017).
As a prelude to other parts of this study, this chapter will discuss the background upon which this study was initiated, the statement of problems that led to this study, the Aim and Objectives of the study. Others are Significance of the study, Scope of work, Research hypothesis and questions, Limitations of the Study and Definition of technical terms.
1.2 Background of Study
Agriculture in Nigeria was the main source of income before the discovery of oil. The main national priority in Nigeria is to make food secure when considering the vast majority of its 198.1 million population (FMARD, 2016). The Nigerian government has made strides to revive the agricultural sector; to diversify its economy in order to match up with other developed countries in the world. Despite the favorable agro-ecological endowments, Nigeria still has low productivity in food production. Only about 32 million hectares or 34.63 percent are used for cultivation out of the total landmass of 92.4 million hectares, which is Nigeria. Therefore, Nigeria lacks both the capacity and capability to cater for the food and nutrition requirements of its teeming population (Fadare et al., 2019).
Farmers cultivate the soil or raises livestock for food and raw materials. Crop farmers, poultry farmers, animal breeders, and other sorts of farmers exist. Although crop farmers and Fulani herders both work in agriculture, crop farmers may also be referred to as stockbreeders. Among the Fulani herders, some individuals practice mixed farming. This demonstrates the connections between farming and herding as a vocation in agriculture. The majority of farmers in Nigeria come from communities in the North Central and Southern regions. Farmers grow a variety of food crops, including yams, rice, maize, guinea-corn, millet, soya beans, cassava, groundnut, cotton, Irish potatoes, sweet potatoes, tomatoes, onions, cabbage, and carrots (IPCR, 2012).
Agricultural sector development is considered to hold the key to economic development for most Sub-Saharan countries including Nigeria (Olukunle, 2013). This is because it contributes immensely to the growth and development of such Sub-Saharan economies as it provides food and raw materials to the non-agricultural sectors of the economy, it provides employment opportunities to a vast majority of unemployed labor and serves as an avenue by which valuable foreign exchange can be earned through the export of agricultural products.
The general state of insecurity in Nigeria presently lends credence to the report that kidnapping is an offshoot of the Niger Delta crisis. This insurgency has thrown a huge cloak of insecurity not just over the entire south-south geopolitical zone, but also the southeast, and southwest. Kidnapping gangs have made the two zones their haven. Noperson is spared in this new wave of crime that seems to have supplanted armed robbery and other non-contact crimes. However, the security challenge this poses to the state of Nigeria is better understood against existing evidence that even government officials and traditional rulers are not spared.
This has led to some of these officials relocating their families outside the geopolitical zone or outside the country. What the current trend of violence is imprinting on the psyche of Nigerians is that the government security apparatus is incapable of guaranteeing the safety and security of its people. This would, therefore, impact on the human security of the people as the situation promotes fear, while at the same time limiting the peoples’ ability to develop economically.
Therefore, in Nigeria where the research was carried out, the activities that was conducted is to determine the Strategies Adopted by Families in Coping with the Challenges of Food Insecurity and Hunger in Makurdi.
1.3 Statement of Problems
Investigation revealed that the farmers have been kidnapped by gunmen, bandits, and armed Fulani herdsmen across the states in Nigeria. In the conflicts between two communities that took place in October 2018 in Kaduna, almost eighty farmers were injured and killed. Kidnapping in the country has become so rampant. Some northern farmers and communities had to pay some amounts to bandits to avoid being attacked.
Increase wave of violence of terrorism, insurgency, arms trafficking, kidnappings, arm robbery, ethnic crisis etc constitutes a devastating threat to the security of lives and property of the citizenry. This research intends to investigate Vulnerability and Socio Economic Effects of Insecurity to national development. The problem of unemployment is adding to the strength of poverty in the country and both are growing stronger (Daniel, 2013).
In many cases of farmland infringements by herdsmen, farmers can only recourse to walking several miles to make reports at the police station. The implication is that before the officers arrive at the crime scene, the offender may have scampered away. Rather than relying on the predominant counterproductive practice, a mobile telecommunications application or software could have been designed primarily for the farmers and the herdsmen to make fast and direct complaints of crimes to the police for immediate intervention or investigation.
1.4 Aim and Objectives of Study
The aim of the study is to determine the Strategies Adopted by Families in Coping with the Challenges of Food Insecurity and Hunger in Makurdi. In achieving this aim, the following specific objectives were laid out as follows:
- To investigate the strategies in food insecurity and hunger problem coping among families in Makurdi;
- To determine the relationship between insecurity and agricultural food loss in the area under study;
- To identify the sources and causes of national food insecurity in the area under study; and
- To determine measures to mitigate and eliminate Socio Economic insecurity on agriculture in Makurdi.
1.5 Research Questions
The study came up with research questions so as to be able to ascertain the above stated objectives. The specific research questions for the study are stated below as follows:
- What are the strategies in food insecurity and hunger problem coping among families in Makurdi?
- What is the relationship between insecurity and agricultural food loss in the area under study?
- What is the sources and causes of national food insecurity in the area under study?
- What are the measures to mitigate and eliminate Socio Economic insecurity on agriculture in Makurdi?
1.6 Research Hypothesis
In order to pursue the objective of this study, the following generalized statements have been designed to guide and aids in obtaining the result for the experiment to be conducted. For this work, the null hypothesis will be represented with H0 while the alternative hypothesis will be represented with hypothesis H1.
Hypothesis One
- H0: There is no significant relationship between insecurity and agricultural food loss in the area under study
- H1: There is a significant relationship between insecurity and agricultural food loss in the area under study
Hypothesis Two
- H0: There are no significant strategies in food insecurity and hunger problem coping among families in Makurdi
- H1: There are significant strategies in food insecurity and hunger problem coping among families in Makurdi
1.7 Significance of Study
The study shall provide an analysis of the nature, causes, Vulnerability and Socio Economic effect of food insecurity on national development in Nigeria with a view to determine measures to mitigate and eliminate the trend. It will also serve a veritable source of information on issues of food insecurity and national development in Nigeria.
This study will be of immense benefit to other researchers who intend to know more on this study and can also be used by non-researchers to build more on their research work. This study contributes to knowledge and could serve as a guide for other study.
1.8 Scope of Study
The scope of the research is focused on the Strategies Adopted by Families in Coping with the Challenges of Food Insecurity and Hunger in Makurdi.
1.9 Limitations of the Study
During the course of this study, many things militated against its completion, some of which are:
- Time Constraint: The time frame given to accomplish this project was very short due to school academic calendar and it was carried out under pressure which made the researcher not to implement some necessary features.
- Research material: availability of research material is a major setback to the scope of the study.
- Frequent power failure: This made the researcher append more money on fuel to ensure sustainable power.
- Financial Constraint: Insufficient fund tends to impede the efficiency of the researcher in sourcing for the relevant materials, literature or information and in the process of data collection (internet, questionnaire and interview).
1.10 Definition of Terms
Insecurity: Insecurity from two perspectives. Firstly, insecurity is the state of being open or subject to danger or threat of danger, where danger is the condition of being susceptible to harm or injury (Achumba, 2013).
Threat: Threat is any circumstance of event with the potential to cause harm to a system in the form of destruction, disclosure, modification of data or denial of service (Fay, 2007).
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