Total household expenditure on food and non-food for 2019 at the national level was N40.2 trillion as against N21.6 trillion in 2009/10 when the last survey was conducted. The National Bureau of Statistics revealed Friday in the Consumption Expenditure Pattern in Nigeria report
Of this total, 56.65% of total household expenditure in 2019 was spent on food with the balance of about 43.35% spent on non- food items. This is against 60.2% spent on food and 39.8 % spent on non-food in 2009/10.
Expenditure on food being higher than expenditure non-food items is an indication of the under-development of Nigeria. In most developed countries, it is the opposite, where the consumption pattern is skewed towards non-food items. The more developed a society becomes, the less it spends on food and the more it spends on nonfood items.
According to the Statistics Agency, Food consumed outside the home, followed by transportation costs and starchy roots, tubers and plantains were responsible for the largest proportion of household expenditure representing a combined 24.16 percent of total household expenditure in 2019.
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The report further stated that, various foods consumed outside the home, starchy roots, tubers and plantains, rice, vegetables, fish and sea food, grains and flours in that order were the top food items households spent on in 2019 accounting for a combined 59.19% of food expenditure and 33.53% of total household expenditure on food and 24.8% of total household expenditure.
Household expenditure on non-food items on the other hand were directed as aforementioned mostly at transport, health, education and services (which includes information technology and communication equipment as well as things like insurance, financial services and so on), rent and fuel and light, accounting for a combined 79.40% of non-food expenditure.
Those in Urban area spent N19.1trillion while those in the rural area spent N21.09 trillion on consumption in 2019. This figures is an increment from N8.4 trillion and N9.36 trillion for urban and rural spending respectively in 2009/10
Against this backdrop total expenditure on food in urban areas stood at N9.8 trillion in 2019 while in rural areas it was N12.9 trillion rising from N3.65 trillion and N9.36 trillion in 2009/2010 respectively.
In the 2019 report by NBS, spending on food consumed outside of home ranked highest with 4,597,611,647,231 (11.43% of total expenditure) followed by spending on starchy root, tubers and plantain with N2,526,248,133,445 (6.28% of total expenditure) and rice and vegetables with N1,978,469,588,752 (4.92% of total expenditure).
Transportation on the other hand, occupy highest place in the non-food expenditure with 2,588,901,034,916 (6.44% of total expenditure) followed by health with 2,460,266,138,597 (6.12% of total expenditure) and education with 2,428,993,052,871 (6.04% of total expenditure).
Further disaggregation by the 6 geo-political zones reveals that the South-West region recorded the highest overall household expenditure as well as the highest expenditure on food and in non food categories, while the North East (excluding Borno) recorded the lowest. As can be seen in the table below, the South-West at about 29.95% of total expenditure, South South at 20.94% and North West at about 17.02% recorded the highest expenditure in 2019. These three regions were therefore responsible for over 67% of total consumption expenditure in the country in 2019.
Lagos State recorded the highest consumption expenditure at N5,068,032,243,934.00 or 12.60% of total household expenditure followed by Oyo (5.83%), Delta (5.38%), Rivers (4.99%) Kano State (4.91%).
Down the table, Taraba recorded the lowest consumption expenditure at 297,379,724,360.00 or 0.74% of total household expenditure followed by Ebonyi (0.77%), Nasarawa (0.95%), Yobe (1.04%) and Gombe State (1.12%)
