The National Nutrition Financing Technical Committee, supported by the World Bank’s Accelerating Nutrition Results in Nigeria (ANRiN) project, has intensified its advocacy for prioritising nutrition interventions in Nigeria’s 2025 national budget.
During a meeting held on Monday in Abuja, director-general of the Budget Office of the Federation, Mr. Tanimu Yakubu emphasised the need for increased funding to tackle Nigeria’s worsening food and nutrition crisis, which has been worsened by ongoing socio-economic challenges.
The committee, which comprises representatives from various federal ministries, the Office of the Vice President, the Nigerian Governors Forum and international partners like the World Bank, highlighted the importance of expanding nutrition budgets across key ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs).
Yakubu urged the inclusion of evidence-based nutrition interventions in the 2025 budgets of MDAs and called for the adoption of a national nutrition budget tagging framework.
“This system will track resources dedicated to nutrition, ensuring effective appropriation, releases, and implementation,” he said.
Task team leader of the ANRiN project, Dr. Ritgak Tilley-Gyado noted that nutrition has been part of Nigeria’s budget circulars since 2021, thanks to ongoing public financial management reforms.
These reforms, which aim to improve budget prioritisation and increase domestic resources for nutrition, are part of wider efforts supported by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation’s SUSTAIN project across 12 Nigerian states.
Tilley-Gyado highlighted that Nigeria’s federal budget allocation for nutrition has steadily increased, from ₦10.8 billion in 2021 to ₦6.5 billion in 2023, with an expected ₦18.0 billion in 2024. This growth is largely due to the leadership of the National Council on Nutrition, chaired by Vice President Kashim Shettima.
Special assistant to the president on public health, Mrs. Uju Anwukah emphasised the need to build on these gains by fostering innovative partnerships with the private sector. She also stressed the importance of establishing Legislative Committees on Food Security and Nutrition to enhance collaboration between the executive and legislative branches.
As Nigeria continues to address food insecurity and malnutrition, the Nutrition Finance Committee’s advocacy represents a critical step toward securing sustainable funding for nutrition interventions, especially for the country’s most vulnerable populations.
