Msme Financing, Agricultural Output, Employment and Food Security in Nigeria

Food (in)security is a critical problem in the Nigerian economy despite large parts of the population in agricultural activities and observation of agricultural surplus. Nigeria’s policy problem is thus, to identify policies that address the demand and supply side sources of food (in)security under economic conditions of adverse link of agricultural production to food security, poverty, lack of assets, and inadequate access to productive and financial resources. The objective of the study, therefore, was to examine the study’s proposition that MSMEs financing helped to ameliorate the adverse effect of agricultural output and unemployment on food availability and food access. The least squares regression with interactive terms technique was employed. The study finds that MSMEs financing improves the effect of real agricultural output and unemployment on food availability and food access with the implication of a threshold level of the loans at which the moderating influence become strong. The study recommends MSMEs financing as a policy for food security. The design of the policy should address loan adequacy, investments in agricultural value added and storage infrastructure goals.