ABSTRACT

Food insecurity is a growing public health issue and a barrier to students achieving adequate nutrition. This study Assessed food security, dietary diversity and anthropometric status of undergraduates in Michael Okpara University of Agriculture, Umudike, Abia State, Nigeria. A cross-sectional research design was adopted for the study. Multi-stage sampling techniques was used to select 300 respondents from eight colleges in the school. Food security status was assessed using 10-item questionnaire from the USDA that is considered the gold standard for assessing food security status among adults (Food and Nutrition Service, 2016).Dietary information was collected using 24 hours dietary recall, Anthropometric measurements and socio-demographic data were collected. Data were Analyzed using statistical package for social sciences (SPSS) software program, version 25.0, descriptive statistics such as frequency, percentage, and correlation was carried out at P< 0.05. The result showed the respondents mean age to be 22.3±1.92. Findings of the study shows that majority (76.0%) of the respondents were food insecure while 5% were marginally food secure. Also very few of the respondent (5.3%) had high dietary diversity score which means that the respondents still have to improve their dietary diversification. The finding also shows that majority (56.0%) of the respondent rely on less expensive foods and (64.7%) limits portion at mealtime as a means of coping with food insecurity. More than half of the respondents had normal weight and few were underweight and overweight. The study further shows that there are significant relationship between food security status and BMI of respondents. In conclusion, the research identifies high rates of food insecurity among university student, as well as their dietary diversity, there is need for creation of interventions and programs to assist university students experiencing food insecurity and dietary diversity should be encouraged most especially the intake of fruits and vegetables among undergraduates.