Over Half of Nigerian States Still Record Inflation Above 30% Despite June Slowdown

Despite a slight decline in Nigeria's headline inflation rate in June 2026, more than half of the country's states, including the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), continued to experience annual inflation rates above 30 per cent, highlighting persistent cost-of-living pressures across the nation.

The latest Consumer Price Index (CPI) report released by the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) showed that Nigeria's headline inflation eased marginally to 15.91 per cent in June from 15.93 per cent recorded in May.

However, a state-by-state analysis of the report revealed that 19 states and the FCT—representing 54.1 per cent of Nigeria's 37 sub-national entities—recorded annual headline inflation rates exceeding 30 per cent.

Niger State posted the highest annual inflation rate at 42.23 per cent, followed by Kogi at 41.59 per cent, while the FCT recorded 39.91 per cent.

Other states with inflation above 30 per cent include Kwara (36.52%), Plateau (35.82%), Sokoto (35.22%), Benue (35.06%), Osun (34.46%), Yobe (34.40%), Kebbi (34.07%), Enugu (34.00%), Bauchi (33.68%), Gombe (33.51%), Oyo (32.81%), Lagos (32.28%), Akwa Ibom (31.85%), Adamawa (31.82%), Ekiti (31.00%), Taraba (30.54%), and Abia (30.28%).

At the lower end of the ranking, Imo recorded the lowest annual inflation rate at 19.47 per cent, followed by Ebonyi (20.79%) and Katsina (21.87%). Other states with inflation below 30 per cent include Rivers, Zamfara, Kaduna, Edo, Cross River, Delta, Borno, Kano, Anambra, Ondo, Ogun, Jigawa, Nasarawa, and Bayelsa.

The NBS cautioned that the figures should not be used for direct price comparisons between states because consumer spending patterns and the weighting of goods and services differ across the country.

Food inflation remained significantly higher in several states than the national average. Kogi recorded the highest annual food inflation at 53.02 per cent, followed by Niger (43.83%) and Benue (40.83%). The FCT also recorded 40.20 per cent, while several other states, including Adamawa, Osun, Kwara, Kebbi, Sokoto, Plateau, Yobe, Enugu, Gombe, Kaduna, Bayelsa, Jigawa, Ekiti, Akwa Ibom, Edo, Bauchi, Zamfara, Delta, Nasarawa, Cross River, and Oyo, posted food inflation rates above 30 per cent.

By contrast, Katsina recorded the lowest annual food inflation at 19.15 per cent, followed by Rivers (23.81%) and Imo (24.60%).

Nationally, food inflation stood at 17.52 per cent year-on-year in June, compared with 25.41 per cent in June 2025. On a month-on-month basis, however, food inflation accelerated to 3.75 per cent from 2.98 per cent in May, driven by rising prices of food items such as tomatoes, fresh pepper, crayfish, dried green peas, beef, garri, cassava flour, cowpea, yam products, Irish potatoes and bananas.

The report also showed mixed monthly inflation movements across states. Niger recorded the highest month-on-month headline inflation at 11.65 per cent, followed by Katsina (8.13%), Kwara (7.52%), Gombe (7.09%), Kebbi (6.99%), Plateau (6.53%), and Lagos (6.37%).

Meanwhile, Bayelsa recorded the sharpest monthly decline in headline inflation at -6.48 per cent, followed by Benue (-5.58%), Cross River (-5.12%), Borno (-4.37%), and Anambra (-4.17%).

For monthly food inflation, Katsina recorded the highest increase at 16.82 per cent, ahead of Kebbi (9.79%) and Niger (8.96%), while Borno (-3.54%), Benue (-2.36%), and Bayelsa (-1.34%) recorded the largest declines.

Reacting to the latest figures, the Chief Executive Officer of the Centre for the Promotion of Private Enterprise (CPPE), Dr. Muda Yusuf, said the June report reflected relative stability in headline inflation but warned that the renewed increase in food prices remained a major concern for households.

According to Yusuf, food inflation continues to drive Nigeria's cost-of-living crisis, eroding purchasing power, worsening poverty and food insecurity, and limiting the benefits of ongoing economic reforms.

He attributed the persistent inflationary pressure to structural challenges, including insecurity, high transportation and logistics costs, elevated energy prices, rising fertiliser costs, supply chain disruptions and imported inflation.

Yusuf also argued that the latest inflation figures do not warrant further monetary policy tightening by the Central Bank of Nigeria, stressing that the government's priority should instead be structural reforms aimed at boosting food production, improving logistics, lowering energy and production costs, expanding domestic petroleum refining and increasing productivity across the economy.