Nigerian farmers are abandoning staple crops for cash crops after fertiliser prices surged by 41% in the past year.
A 50kg bag of NPK now sells for ₦60,500, up from ₦43,000, while urea has risen to ₦51,000. Some blends, like NPK 20:10:10, more than doubled in two years to ₦61,000.
The hikes have made staples such as maize, rice, and cassava increasingly unprofitable. Many farmers are switching to less fertiliser-intensive crops like sesame, sorghum, soybeans, groundnuts, and millet.
“I dropped maize this season because fertiliser alone would cost over ₦360,000 per hectare,” said Abubakar Aliu, a farmer in Taraba.
Experts warn the trend could threaten food security, with reduced cultivation of staples likely to push prices higher. Nigeria already spends heavily on food imports and cultivates less than half of its arable land.
The suspension of the Presidential Fertiliser Initiative and global supply chain pressures have further fueled costs, leaving smallholder farmers with limited options.