ABSTRACT

 Food insecurity amongst University students is a rising crisis. Students’ inability to access nutritional food on a consistent basis can negatively impact their dietary practices, students’ retention, academic success, mental and physical health and social mobility. The study was carried out using a cross-sectional survey for a convenience sample of 432 respondents to investigate the food security status, dietary practices and nutritional status among students of Michael Okpara University ofAgriculture Umudike, Abia state with the aim of determining their socio-economic and demographic status, assessing their dietary practices, evaluating their food security status and determining their nutritional status. General information, 24 hours dietary recall, U.S Adult food security module and anthropometric data were obtained by means of questionnaire. Data was presented in frequencies, percentages, means and standard deviations. Correlation, chi-square, T-test and regression analyses assessed relationships between socio demographic/economic characteristics and dietary practices. The study revealed 69.7% of the respondents were males, while 30.3% were females. Based on marital status, 95.8% of the respondents were singles while 4.2% were married. The distribution ofthe religion and tribe of the respondents revealed that 91.2%, ofthe respondent were Christians. This was expected since the study was carried out in the Eastern part of Nigeria which is dominated by the Igbos who were mainly Christians. According to the study, the socio-economic characteristics of students who had monthly income and expenditure less than #30,000 were 58.6% and 45.1%. Based on Dietary practices, majority (89.9%) ofthe respondents skipped meals and out of the 89.9% that skip meal 69.4% skipped lunch and 69.9% ofrespondents skipped meal because they could not afford it. The study also revealed low consumption of vegetables and fruits among respondents of which about 69.7% and 71.3% consumed vegetables and fruits once a week. The result showed that 12.5% ofrespondents consumed Okpa as breakfast. The study also showed the level offood security and insecurity status among the respondents and from the result, it was observed that 35.4% ofthe respondents were highly food secure, 48.4% ofthe respondents were marginal food secure, 10.2% were Low food insecure while 4.9% had very low food security. Result from the Body mass index of the respondents revealed that 11.3% were underweight, 72.9% were normal weight, 17.8% ofthe respondents were overweight while 3.9% were in obesity grade one. Results from the waist hip ratio ofthe respondents revealed that 97.5% ofthe respondents were normal while 2.5% are at risk. The study's findings indicated a substantial correlation between the respondents' body mass index, monthly income, monthly expenditure and their sex. Result revealed that there was a substantial correlation between monthly income and skipping meals (p<0.05). The study also demonstrated that there is a significant relationship between monthly expenditure and skipping meals. The likelihood offood availability and anxiety over running out of food were both significantly correlated with skipping meals (p<0.05). Based on the study's findings, it is advised .that awareness should be raised to educate and sensitize leaders and experts in the field of nutrition as well as the general public to every aspect related to access, availability, preparation, and utilization to satisfy individual physiological needs.