Stephen Onyeiwu

Nigerians doing their grocery shopping in July 2023 are paying 25% more for staple items than they did a year ago.

Nigeria’s inflation rate stands at about 22.79%, but the prices of staple food items like eggs, bread, evaporated milk, palm oil and plantain have risen by over 25% within the past year.

Using the Nigerian Bureau of Statistics monthly data on food prices, I estimate that a moderate-income family of four, consuming staple foods like egg, milk, bread, rice, beans, garri, beef, catfish, plantains and vegetable oil, spent about 64,000 naira (US$80) on food in May 2022.

By May of 2023, this family would have spent about 80,000 naira ($100), a 25% increase. Data compiled by the World Economic Forum show that the average Nigerian household spends about 56% of its income on food. That’s the highest in the world.

Three other African countries that spend a