Gender, Empowerment and Food Security Status of Households in Nigeria

Gender inequality in access to productive and economic resources has been a topical issue in sub-Saharan Africa. The restrictive access to resources, assets and decision making by women has been linked to food insecurity. Using a large cross-sectional dataset from the 2018/2019 Living Standard Measurement Survey, this paper examines the interrelationship among gender, empowerment and households’ food security status in Nigeria. The analytical techniques adopted include the empowerment index, dietary diversity score and the Tobit and the ordered probit regression models. The findings suggest that the level of empowerment is generally low in Nigeria (21.63%) but much worse among the female gender (11.78%). The results also show that female gender and rural and North West residents were mostly in the food insecure and disempowered group. The study concludes that empowerment and food policy measures that would enhance access and control of productive and economic resources by the female gender and rural and North West residents should be formulated to ensure the achievement of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of ending hunger and promoting gender equality.