Malnutrition: Remi Tinubu urges govs to establish food banks
The First Lady, Senator Oluremi Tinubu, has urged state governors to establish functional community food banks across their three senatorial districts to strengthen food security and tackle malnutrition among vulnerable…
Malnutrition remains a persistent public health challenge in Nigeria, with UNICEF and government data repeatedly flagging the country as home to one of the world's highest burdens of stunting and wasting among children under five, driven by poverty, food insecurity, conflict in some regions, and inflation that has pushed staple foods beyond the reach of many households. Food banks—community-level stores that collect and redistribute food to vulnerable groups—have been promoted in various forms by state and non-governmental actors as a stopgap measure, though their reach and sustainability across Nigeria's 36 states have historically been uneven.
As First Lady, Oluremi Tinubu has used her office to champion maternal and child welfare initiatives, and her call for governors to set up food banks in each of their states' three senatorial districts points to an attempt to decentralise food-security interventions down to the grassroots. The coverage does not specify funding sources, implementation timelines, or how such a programme would be coordinated between the federal and state governments, leaving open questions about how governors are expected to resource and sustain the initiative.