An Econometric Analysis of Food Security and Agricultural Credit Facilities in Nigeria

It is a known fact that the efficiency of credit facility positively contributes to production base of a sector, especially the Nigerian agricultural sector which is recognised as the heartbeat of the economy by employing over 70% of the country’s labour force; this forms the motivation for this study.

This study examined the potential of agricultural credit facilities in terms of commercial bank credit to agriculture and agricultural credit guarantee scheme fund (ACGSF) and their corresponding interest rates to farmers towards increasing agricultural production as the pathway to food security in Nigeria.

The study employed the Autoregressive Distribution Lag (ARDL) econometric approach on the time series data sourced from the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) statistical bulletin, Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) and the World Development Indicators (WDI) for the period 1990-2016.

The result from ARDL showed that commercial banks credits and ACGSF increased food security by 8.12% and 0.002% respectively, while population reduces food security by 0.001%.

The study concluded that population should be controlled through family planning and adequate financing of the ACFSF by the government and monitor commercial banks leading interest rates on credit facilities.