Malnutrition And Out Of School Children In Nigeria
BY INWALOMHE DONALD
ARMED banditry is directly driving a severe humanitarian crisis in Northwest, Northcentral, Northeast Nigeria by weaponizing food production and systematically dismantling the educational infrastructure. The combination of violent raids, mass kidnappings, and economic extortion has trapped millions of families in a cycle of extreme deprivation and displacement. Insecurity has transformed a highly productive agricultural region into a hunger zone. Over 6.4 million children under five across the country suffer from acute malnutrition, with the Northwest zone containing some of the highest concentrations of Severe Acute Malnutrition.
According to World Food Programme, nearly 35 million people in Nigeria are projected to face severe food insecurity during next year’s June-August lean season. That is the highest hunger level the analysis has ever recorded for Nigeria, and the highest in Africa. Surging violence, especially in North-Central, North West, North East Nigeria, is driving the uptick – and funding cuts may leave WFP and other humanitarians unable to provide a desperately needed lifeline.
In northern Nigeria, 6 million people are expected to experience acute or worse food insecurity in 2026. In Borno State, roiled by kidnappings and conflict. 15,000 people risk catastrophic food insecurity next year – the highest level under the global standard for measuring food insecurity.
Malnutrition in northern Nigeria is a severe crisis affecting over 6 million children and pregnant women, driven by extreme poverty, armed conflict, high inflation, and climate shocks. Millions suffer from acute and chronic forms of undernutrition, like stunting and wasting, while health and relief groups face critical funding shortages.
Fifteen years into the armed conflict in north-east Nigeria, food insecurity is threatening the lives of many of the country’s youngest. Nearly 6.4 million children under the age of five suffer from acute malnutrition across the northeast, northwest, and north central regions, one of the most devastating and relentless consequences of the conflict.
There is a link between malnutrition and out of school children in Nigeria. 18.3 million out-of-school children, driven by widespread poverty, regional insecurity, and a lack of adequate school facilities. This total includes 10.2 million children at the primary level and 8.1 million at the junior secondary school level. According to the UNICEF Nigeria office, this gives Nigeria one of the highest numbers of out-of-school children in the entire world.
Nigeria faces a severe malnutrition crisis with the second-highest burden of stunted children globally, where 32% of under-fives are affected, 2 million suffer from severe acute malnutrition, and 11 million experience severe food poverty. Nigeria has the second highest burden of stunted children in the world, with a national prevalence rate of 32 percent of children under five. An estimated 2 million children in Nigeria suffer from severe acute malnutrition (SAM), but only two out of every 10 children affected is currently reached with treatment. Seven percent of women of childbearing age also suffer from acute malnutrition.
The States in northern Nigeria are the most affected by the two forms of malnutrition – stunting and wasting. High rates of malnutrition pose significant public health and development challenges for the country. Stunting, in addition to an increased risk of death, is also linked to poor cognitive development, a lowered performance in education and low productivity in adulthood – all contributing to economic losses estimated to account for as much as 11 percent of Gross Domestic Product (GDP).
Young Nigerians continue to bear the brunt of one of the country’s most enduring failures. A UNICEF report published in 2024 revealed that Nigeria has the highest tally of out-of-school debacle globally. The report stated that no fewer than 10.2 million children are not in school at the primary level, while 8.1 million others are similarly absent at the junior secondary school level. The dataset noted that 66 per cent of this huge figure is from the North-West and North-East geopolitical regions.
The 2026 fiscal budget for education was notably a drop from the 7.3 per cent allocated in 2025 under the same administration. Viewed side by side, the figures are both a bothersome deviation from the UNESCO benchmark, which recommends that countries should allocate 4 to 6 per cent of their Gross Domestic Product, or 15 to 20 per cent of their total public expenditure, to education. Without doubt, the current funding disposition paves the way for the far-reaching shortcomings in the education sector, whose consequences are both immediate and enduring.
In Kwara, Plateau, Niger and Nasarawa states, several incidents between November 2025 and the present have left many families in deep and enduring grief. In response to worsening insecurity, multiple schools across northern Nigeria have been forced to suspend operations. There is no doubt that Nigeria’s deteriorating security situation has further worsened the country’s out-of-school crisis, already estimated at 18.3 million children according to 2022 data from the UNICEF. With learning centres increasingly becoming flashpoints for attacks, school closures have, in many cases, become a necessary measure to deny terrorists potential access points.
Northern Nigeria faces a severe education emergency, accounting for roughly 80% of Nigeria’s estimated 20 million out-of-school children. This crisis is driven by widespread poverty, ongoing insecurity from insurgency and banditry, cultural barriers, and the out-of-school Almajiri system.
I must raise the alarm over the growing number of out of school children in Northern Nigeria, I am warning that the continued sidelining of the out of school children in the region in federal budgeting and infrastructure development poses grave dangers to national unity and progress. I want to describe the northern region’s situation as nothing short of a national emergency, particularly in the areas of education, infrastructure, and economic inclusion. I must lament the failure of successive administrations to address the North’s growing population of out-of-school children.
NIGERIA’S out-of-school children debacle has been an intractable phenomenon, threatening the country’s socioeconomic landscape for decades. It is interlinked with the lingering insecurity, crushing unemployment, grinding poverty, emerging child soldier syndrome, drug abuse, national image deficit and a bleak future.
Every child that is out of school is a threat to all the children sent abroad for educational attainment. And, a country that neglects the education of its youth compromises its future and sits dangerously on a powder keg. UNESCO and UNICEF list Nigeria, India, Pakistan, Ethiopia and DR Congo as recording the highest number of out-of-school children globally.
Inwalomhe Donald writes via inwalomhe.donald@yahoo.com
