Measures of enhancing food security among households in Edo Central Senatorial District

Abstract

This paper is aimed at examining the enhancement of food security among households in Edo Central Senatorial District. The study examines the measure used by households in enhancing food security. A descriptive survey design was adopted in this study, using a population of about 664,059 households, with a sample size of 300 households using multi-stage sampling technique. The instrument for data collection was a questionnaire. A mean score of 2.5 was used as the benchmark rating score for decision rule. The t-test for two independent sample means was used to test the hypothesis at 0.05 level of significance. The result showed that poverty, lack of food preservation knowledge, lack of food and nutrition knowledge, low morale towards the practice of agriculture and lack of facilities for food preservation such as refrigerators and deep freezers are the factors responsible for food insecurity amongst households in Edo Central Senatorial District. To reduce food shortage and promote food security, the measures commonly used among households in enhancing their food security in Edo Central Senatorial District include: food preservation and bulk purchasing. The use of these food security measures varies with the size of household. It was recommended that large households should endeavour to practice crop farming and animal rearing such as poultry farming for family subsistence.