Keywords
Nutrition
COVID-19 lockdown
Omicron variants
Niger State
How to Cite
Abstract
As nations all over the world are taking a second look at a lockdown for the vaccine-evasive
Omicron variants, it is important to note the effect of the 2020 COVID-19 lockdown on food and
nutrition security before taking any measure on Omicron variants containment policy in Nigeria.
The main objective of this paper is to provide empirical evidence on how COVID-19 lockdown
affected access to food and nutrition security in the State. Specifically, Likert scale was used to
identify the food nutrition that was most challenging to access, and Student’s t-test was applied to
test if there are differences in the impact of the lockdown between rural and urban households'
food and nutrition security. A total of 297 households were interviewed using a structured
questionnaire. A multistage sampling technique was used in the selection of the households in the
State. Findings showed that the households were affected differently by region. The urban region
experienced more difficulties obtaining carbohydrates, proteins, minerals, and vitamin foods than
the rural regions where some of these foods are produced. Also, clean water was more readily
available to urban than rural households. The increase in prices coupled with no/low income
threatened food and nutrition security. This paper provides recommendations for omicron variants
containment policy that addresses food security indicators mostly affected by the 2020 COVID-19
lockdown, especially in the food unsecured regions.
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