The Cost of a Healthy Diet
The Cost of a Healthy Diet
+Wise Gardening or Wild Gathering?
The Cost of a Healthy Diet
In her much-loved song, Jailer, Asa likens everyone who has some form of fear to a prisoner, whether they are inmates or not.
When it comes to the economy, especially food prices, the majority of Nigerians are held in this prison of fear, whether they are members of the political class or the proletariat.
In a way, “we are all just prisoners here of our own device”, in the words of Majek Fashek’s sample of Hotel California.
Inmate Fears
Have you ever thought about how much it costs to eat healthy each day?
Well, data from the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) shows that for December 2023, the national average Cost of a Healthy Diet for (CoHD) adults is N786 per day, excluding the cost of transportation and meal preparation.
This is just slightly above the daily cost of feeding inmates in Nigeria’s Correctional Centres as of December 2023.
“The Controller General of the NCoS, Haliru Nababa had before Senator Adams Oshiomhole openly admitted that they have a budget of N800 per dog daily, while humans individually have meals worth N750 each day,” The Guardian reported last December.
The NBS identified at least two major users of the CoHD estimates. One is for policy makers, and the other is for the individual’s choices on healthy living.
“The Cost of a Healthy Diet was developed as a tool for policymaking and planning,” the NBS noted. It added that the “Food-based dietary guidelines serve the purpose of helping individuals identify and plan a healthy diet”
On the policy side, this may be cheery news to Nigerians residing in correctional centres around the country. On demand from inmates, warders who cater to their feeding may attempt the NBS template to ensure they provide healthy diets from the meagre amounts allocated to the inmates.
The Cost of a Healthy Diet (CoHD) is the least expensive amount needed to procure a combination of locally available items that meets globally consistent food-based dietary guidelines.
The CoHD is used as a measure of physical and economic access to healthy diets. The fear is: will warders provide these healthy diets to Nigerians residing in Custodial Centre whether for good or bad reasons?
Individual Fears
Other Nigerians have their own fears too. This concerns the high food prices and the accompanying high food inflation rate.
Between December 2022 and 2023, the average cost of a healthy diet per day increased by N313, from N473 to N786. The December 2023 CoHD is the highest in the 13 months reviewed.
The NBS reported that in December 2023, the average CoHD was highest in the South West at N979 per adult per day, compared to N663 per adult per day in North West.
In recent months, the CoHD has risen faster than general inflation and food inflation.
Source: NBS
The official data bureau cautioned that the CoHD and the food CPI are not directly comparable because the CoHD considered fewer items and is measured in Naira per day, while the food CPI is a weighted index.
This increase in the cost of a healthy diet means that more people may not be able to afford a healthy diet, especially when transportation and preparation costs are added.
However, the costs differ across the 6 geo-political zones. The southern parts spend more to consume a healthy diet daily compared to the North.
Between October and December 2023, the cost of a healthy diet in the North did not exceed N700 compared to the South. In December, the South West pay the highest cost of a healthy diet per day while the North West pay the lowest.
Similarly, 16 out of the 36 states and the FCT recorded cost of a healthy diet that is higher than the national average of N786 while 21 other states paid less for the same proportion.
Interestingly, all the states that paid less for the cost of a healthy diet are in the north except for Delta State.
However, if you find yourself spending more on food than what the least healthy diet costs in your state, you can consider evaluating your purchasing habits.
You can look into buying cheaper food items that still allow you to consume all recommended food groups or reducing your expenses on non-recommended foods, such as salty snacks and sugary items. Additionally, consider changing the market where you buy your food, as it may help you achieve lower costs.
You may also try DIY backyard gardening to grow basic food crops that can reduce the overall costs of purchasing food items.
The Composition of a Healthy Diet
To construct the CoHD, retail prices of food items across food groups were collected with specific calorie contents determined from food composition tables and the Healthy Diet Basket.
In addition, as of December 2023, animal-source foods were the most expensive food group recommendation to meet.
For animal protein, one needs to spend 38% of the total CoHD to meet its dietary level of 13% of total calories.
Fears Bothering on Bread
If you live in Abuja, you may be paying more for bread in the coming weeks than before.
Why? The Abuja chapter of the Association of Master Bakers and Caterers of Nigeria has announced its plans to increase the price of bread due to increases in the prices of flour and other baking materials.
Similarly, a group of widows took to the streets of Kano to protest against the soaring price of flour, sugar and other baking materials, which has ripple effects on all its derivatives.
The Bakers Association attributed the increase in the price of bread and all baked products to several factors ranging from the increased cost of energy, Naira fall in the FX market and other production costs, Punch reported.
In the last one year, the average price of bread has increased, from N496 in December 2022 to N815 in December 2023.
Bread is one of the staple foods in Nigeria, widely consumed in households across the country.
With the recent adjustment in bread prices, many households that include bread in their dietary options may find themselves spending more than budgeted.
We sampled opinions on how people have been managing the increasing cost of bread, here is what we found:
Some have reduced intake of bread, adjusting their consumption pattern.
Some considered Do it yourself (DIY) - getting the baking ingredients to bake at home,
Some bread lovers resorted to purchasing bread at bakeries rather than retail stores, to reduce the purchasing cost.
Some have stylishly removed bread from their dietary options to reduce their intake of carbohydrates.
Does any of these look like something you would consider?
Wise Gardening or Wild Gathering?
As low and almost impracticable as the cost of healthy diets may seem, the NBS foresees that some Nigerians may not be able to afford it.
Indeed, the average CoHD suggests that N23,580 is needed monthly for one adult’s diet. Even for a single person who earns the current minimum wage of N30,000 (and less in some states), the cost of a healthy diet takes away 80% of their income, apart from the cost of cooking fuel and transport to buy the food items.
This single person also must pay for housing, electricity, transport, health, and other necessities of life. Thus, it is likely that 82.9 million Nigerians living on less than $1.90 per day may not be able to afford even this seemingly low cost of a healthy diet.
For the majority of Nigerians who may not be able to afford the CoHD, the NBS provides 3 options:
“Where healthy diets are unaffordable, people might seek social assistance programmes, or other ways of obtaining food that may be lower cost (or that substitute time for money), such as wild gathering of some food items or backyard gardening.”
Which of the three options do you prefer, or suggest?
Thanks for reading this edition of Pocket Science.
This edition of Pocket Science was composed by Funmilayo Babatunde. It was edited by Oluseyi Olufemi.