REPORT: HOW CORPORATIONS HOOK NIGERIANS ON UNHEALTHY FOODS, INCREASE NCDs

A new report has exposed how food corporations use a sophisticated web of marketing strategies to get Nigerians – especially children and young adults – hooked on ultra-processed foods which damage their health, undermine public health policies, and cost the Nigerian healthcare systems billions. The report “Junk on Our Plates: Exposing Deceptive Marketing of Unhealthy Foods Across Seven States in Nigeria” was unveiled Wednesday in Lagos by pan-African nongovernmental organisation (NGO) Corporate Accountability and Public Participation Africa (CAPPA). It detailed a systematic, profit-driven assault on public health by the food and beverage industry, CAPPA said. According to the NGO, the findings showed that through “aggressive marketing, cultural co-optation, celebrity endorsements, and deceptive labelling, the corporations had entrenched ultra-processed, high-sugar, and high-sodium products in Nigeria's food environment—targeting children, youth, low-income communities, and cultural identities to drive sales. It accused the industry of leveraging extensive advertising, cultural trends, pricing strategies, and distribution networks to influence food culture and dietary habits, often prioritising highly processed, calorie-dense, and nutrient-poor foods due to their profitability and long shelf life. This, it added, was causing the slow disappearance of healthy, natural, indigenous foods from Nigerians’ menus. CAPPA acknowledged the Nigerian government’s “bold steps” to confront the challenge by, for example, introducing the Sugar-Sweetened Beverage (SSB) Tax of N10 per litre on SSBs aimed at discouraging their excessive consumption and reducing the risk of diet-related diseases. It noted further that in 2023, the National Agency for Food and Drug Administration Control (NAFDAC) followed up with regulations on transfats and pre-packaged food labelling, while in March 2025, the government launched the National Guideline for Sodium Reduction, a strategic policy meant to tackle the excessive salt content in packaged foods, a major driver of high blood pressure and heart disease in the country. “All of these are good steps, Akinbode Oluwafemi, CAPPA’s Executive Director said, but noted that “The food and beverage industry continues to exploit loopholes. They use covert marketing, target children, and take advantage of weak enforcement of existing regulations to flood the market with unhealthy products — tactics reminiscent of the deadly strategies long used by the tobacco industry. In some cases, they also take advantage of weak border controls and ignore product standards altogether.” CAPPA warned that the widespread promotion of these foods, high in saturated fats, salt, and sugar (HFSS), is increasingly redefining global dietary patterns and impacting public health. It added that as HFSS foods become dominant in markets worldwide, “non-communicable diseases (NCDs) such as obesity, diabetes, and cardiovascular conditions linked to their excessive consumption have also risen, highlighting the need for stronger public health interventions to balance the food industry's influence with consumer well-being.” Raising the alarm, Oluwafemi said: “These tactics undermine existing public health policies,” adding that the industry takes advantage of policy gaps to create an illusion of choice, “while denying people the right to accurate information and healthier options.” The report made several recommendations, including a call for “stronger rules on marketing, particularly to children.” Oluwafemi added: “We need clear and readable front-of-pack warning labels on processed foods. We need limits on salt and sugar content. And we need public awareness campaigns and food policymaking that are state-led, free from corporate sponsorship or influence.” Other recommendations include strengthening regulations on the marketing of unhealthy foods, particularly to children; increasing Nigeria's SSB tax from N10 to N130 to make sugary beverages less cost-attractive; and implementing national sodium reduction programs. “Nigeria can take impactful steps toward promoting healthier dietary habits, reducing the crippling burden of non-communicable diseases and safeguarding the well-being of its population,” he added. Corroborating him, CAPPA’s Assistant Executive Director Zikora Ibeh added: “We have discovered that the food environment in Nigeria these days is changing but for the worse. Increasingly, we are consuming items that are unhealthy. We are taking too much salt, sugar, fat and too much processed items that are harmful. “Nobody is saying these corporations should be shut down. We're saying that government needs to step up enforcement and regulations on these products so that people look at products and clearly understand immediately what is bad for eating and how much they are not supposed to consume.” She urged Nigeria to “also invest in food systems that prioritise the health of its people over the profit margins of multinationals. This means direct public investment in local food production, expansion of agroecological farming systems, and a reversal of trade policies that allow unhealthy foreign products to flood the market.” Humphrey Ukeaja, Industry Monitoring Officer CAPPA, said the report established the “ongoing trend of false narratives and the tactics of intentional misinformation deployed by the food and beverage industry in Nigeria to promote unhealthy diets. “These strategies, including extensive advertising, exploitation of cultural trends, and strategic pricing, contribute to the increased consumption of calorie-dense, nutrient-poor foods, driving a rise in non-communicable diseases (NCDs). “In Nigeria, the prevalence of NCDs has risen sharply over the past decades with these diseases accounting for at least 30 per cent of all deaths annually, and the urgency for effective policy interventions has never been greater.” Harping on the need to protect children from the industry, CAPPA’s Programme Officer SSB Tax Campaign Opeyemi Ibitoye, added: “If there's a restriction to how these SSB products are marketed, especially to kids around school, within their schools, this will curb how children request for most of these drinks and products. It will also promote public health, which is our target for this advocacy.” The NGO thanked “the remarkable efforts of its young advocates under the umbrella of the Healthy Food Policy Youth Vanguard (HFPYV) and the CAPPA Digital Media Volunteers (CAPPA DMV), who devoted time and resources to conducting this offline survey.” It further acknowledged the technical support and guidance provided by the Global Health Advocacy Incubator (GHAI) team, which birthed the report.