A nationwide study across Nigeria’s six regions has shown that floods now come earlier, hit harder, and leave female farmers hungrier, poorer, and mostly on their own.

The new study titled: “Climate Change Induced Flooding: Implications for Food Security and Income among Female Smallholder Farmers in Nigeria,” by four researchers, led by Dr. Judith Ifunanya Ani, the Principal Investigator, and funded by the Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA), says it is time for action that puts women first.

The female farmer in Jigawa had done everything right. She saved her money, bought seed, prepared her farm, and waited for harvest. Then the flood came. “I invested my money in the farm thinking I would make profits, and then floods came and washed away everything,” she told the researchers, “We are just managing life.”

Her story is not unusual. Across Nigeria, from the dry plains of the North to the creeks of the Niger Delta, women who grow much of the food on our tables are losing their crops, income, and food security to floods that worsen each year.

The study puts numbers and voices to this crisis. Its message is simple: climate change is no longer a distant threat. It is now in Nigerian homes, and women are paying the highest price.

The research team, Dr. Judith Ifunanya Ani of Walter Sisulu University, South Africa, Dr. Oluwayemisi K. Adeleke (Redeemer University, Ede, Osun State, Nigeria), Dr. Loveth C. Ode Omenka (Bells University of Technology, Ogun State, Nigeria), and Dr. Brendaline B. Ngwengeh (University of Buea, Cameroon), set out to answer four questions. How has Nigeria’s climate changed over time? How do floods affect the food women can put on the table (food insecurity)? How much income do they lose? And how do they cope?

To find out, they went to one state in each of Nigeria’s six geopolitical zones: Bauchi, Jigawa, Kogi, Bayelsa, Ogun, and Anambra. They surveyed smallholder female farmers and held several focus group discussions, in-depth interviews, key informant interviews, and case studies with farmers, community leaders, government officials, and non-governmental organisations.

The women they met were among Nigeria’s most vulnerable. Most live in rural areas (87%). Most earn less than ₦60,000 a month (87%). Most have no access to credit (86%) and no internet (83%).

The study looked back over several decades and found a major shift. From the 1960s to the 1980s, Nigeria’s biggest climate threat was drought. Today, it is increasingly flood.

The country is being pulled in two directions. In the North, rainfall is declining over time, bringing drought, desert expansion, and crop failure. In the South and along the coast, rain is heavier and harder to predict, and floods come more often. Meanwhile, the country is getting hotter: average temperatures rose from 27.0°C in 2001 to 27.8°C in 2022.

For farmers, the most painful change is that the old calendar no longer works. “Before, we used to expect floods around September, but now it can start as early as July, and we are not always ready,” a woman in Bayelsa said. In Kogi, another put it plainly: “The floods keep coming almost every year.”

When floods destroy a farm, they destroy a family’s food supply too. Harvests rot, stored grain is washed away, and seeds for the next season are lost.

The study found that nearly 8 in 10 households (78%) worried their food would run out before they had money to buy more. About three in four could only sometimes afford a balanced meal. Many families ate less, ate cheaper food, or gave up the variety that keeps children and adults healthy.

Where a woman lives matters a great deal. Two women with the same education and similar farms can face very different levels of hunger, simply because one lives in a state hit harder by floods. That means a one-size-fits-all response will not work.

The financial damage is heavy and measurable. The worse the flooding, the more women lose. On average, each step up in flood severity cuts a woman’s monthly income by about ₦22,279.

For most women in the study, who earn less than ₦60,000 a month, that is more than a third of their monthly income gone.

Floods affect income in two ways. First, directly, by destroying crops, livestock, and farm investments. Second, indirectly, hungry households spend what little they have on food, leaving nothing to rebuild. Many fall into debt just to survive until the next season.

When disaster strikes, most women are left to fend for themselves. To get by, they borrow money, skip meals, take on extra work, and rely on traditional farming knowledge passed down through generations.

Outside help is thin. The study rated communities on how well they are protected, and the results are worrying.

On early warning, the study rated it low. Most women get little or no notice before floods arrive. Also, it found government and community response low, household preparedness low, and overall preparedness only about 1 in 5 (20%).

Family, neighbours, and social networks were the strongest sources of support. They are a lifeline, but they cannot replace proper systems.

There is also a knowledge gap. Most women knew little about climate change. The women who knew the most were those who had already survived a flood. In other words, too many women learn about climate change only after it has taken everything.

Floods do not affect everyone equally. Women farmers often have weaker land rights, less access to loans, and fewer savings to fall back on. Floods make all of these problems worse.

The study found that floods push women off their land, break their ties to ancestral farmland, and weaken their place in the community. Some give up farming altogether and move away. The researchers warn that this is driving a growing “feminisation of poverty” in rural Nigeria.

The damage goes beyond money. Women described trauma and stress after losing everything. The study also points to risks for women’s health, including reproductive health, and to gender-based violence in the hard times that follow a flood.

This matters for everyone. When women farmers fail, households go hungry, communities weaken, and the nation’s food supply suffers.

The findings carry clear lessons for government and decision-makers.

Floods are a food security emergency, not only an environmental one. Flood planning must sit alongside agriculture, nutrition, and poverty programmes, not apart from them.

Climate policy must see women. Policies that treat “farmers” as a single group overlook the women who are hit hardest. Women’s needs must be written into national and state climate plans.

Prevention is cheaper than rescue. With overall preparedness at just 20%, Nigeria is paying for floods after they happen rather than preparing in advance.

Local problems need local solutions. Because flood effects differ so much by state, responses must be designed state by state and community by community.

Information saves livelihoods. Low awareness and weak early warning mean women cannot act in time, even when floods are predicted.

Traditional knowledge is an asset. Communities already hold coping knowledge that formal programmes too often ignore.

The study ties these lessons to Nigeria’s commitments under the Sustainable Development Goals, especially to ending poverty and hunger, achieving gender equality, and advancing climate action.

The researchers point to practical steps that can make a difference quickly.

They recommended early warnings that reach women. There should be flood alerts sent by radio, SMS, town criers, religious centres, and women’s groups, in local languages, weeks before the rains peak.

There should be emergency support after floods. This can be in the area of fast food relief, cash support, and replacement seeds and livestock so women can replant in the next season, not years later.

The study called for credit and insurance for women farmers. This can be low-interest loans, savings groups, and crop insurance, so a single flood does not wipe out a family’s future.

The researchers identified safe storage and flood-resistant farming as another solution. This is through raised storage, early-maturing and flood-tolerant crop varieties, and advice on when and where to plant.

They advocated for secure land rights for women, noting that this would protect women’s access to farmland, including after displacement.

There should be climate education before disaster. This can be through community training through extension workers, schools, and women’s associations, so women learn before the flood, not after.

Finally, they called for health and counselling support. Psychosocial care and health services for women and families affected by floods.

Federal and state governments should build and implement women-centred climate adaptation policies, fund flood preparedness in every state budget, and strengthen early warning systems so alerts reach rural women in time.

Ministries of Agriculture and Women Affairs should improve women’s access to land, finance, improved seeds, and farm technology, and train extension workers to reach women farmers directly.

Emergency management agencies should shift from responding after floods to preparing for them, working with communities to plan for evacuation, safe storage, and recovery.

Development partners and NGOs should increase climate funding for vulnerable farming communities and support women’s savings groups, insurance schemes, and livelihood recovery.

Traditional and religious leaders should protect women’s land rights, help spread flood warnings, and support community-led, culturally rooted ways of coping.

Researchers and the media should keep the voices of rural women in public debate and track whether promised support actually reaches them.

The floods will come again next year. The question is whether Nigeria’s women farmers will face them alone once more.

The study shows that the damage is predictable, and much of it is preventable. With timely warnings, fair access to land and credit, and support designed with women rather than for them, the women who feed the nation can withstand the water instead of being swept away by it.