Why Garri is more popular than Rice in Nigeria

Posted by Felix Okoli on Sunday June 15, 2014 at 19:44:33:

Rice is a popular food; it is eaten by virtually all the countries of the world.

Rice is cultivated in swampy areas, after it is harvested; it is per boiled packaged in 50kg bags, while Garri on the other hand is a popular staple food that is eaten in Nigeria. Garri is gotten from processed cassava tuber that has been grinded, sieved and fried. Garri can be mixed with water and drank like cereal with sugar milk and groundnuts; it can be prepared with hot water to solidify it and eaten with soup. Both rice and garri are popular food widely eaten in Nigeria, but the demand for garri is high than that of rice, not wonder so people use this pigin English slogan "Garri no get advert but e dey sell pass any pass bread".

Let’s look at some of the reason why garri is more popular than rice in Nigeria.

- Affordability: The price of garri is generally cheaper than that of rice, since people can plant, harvest and process their own cassava to Garri at little or no cost, so people tend to opt for the cheaper option.

- Satisfies Better Than Rice: When you swallow Garri, it satisfies you faster and rice and it does not digest as fast as rice, so it stays awhile better you start feeling hunger after a meal of garri and so. That is another reason why most people opt for it, especially people that engage in hard blue collar jobs.

- It is cultivated in most parts of Nigeria: Unlike rice which is mostly imported and grown in few locations, garri is more commonly grown as cassava and then processed by many people. Cassava is mostly grown through subsistence farming and it's cheaper to cultivate than rice.