This study examined the effect of commercial bank loans to the agricultural sector on food inflation in Nigeria. Food inflation was used as a proxy for food security. The study adopted an ex post facto research design and used annual time series data covering the period 1990 to 2023. Data were obtained from the Central Bank of Nigeria, the National Bureau of Statistics, and the World Development Indicators. The Ordinary Least Squares regression technique was applied. The result showed that commercial bank loans to agriculture had a negative but statistically insignificant effect on food inflation at the 5 percent level. This indicates that increased bank lending to agriculture did not significantly reduce food inflation during the period reviewed. The study concludes that commercial bank credit alone is insufficient to address food insecurity in Nigeria without proper targeting, timely disbursement, and supportive production conditions.
Keywords: Food Security, Government Expenditure, Nigeria, agricultural finance, agricultural funding, commercial bank loans, food inflation, public spending
