Abstract

This study assessed food insecurity, physical activity and anthropometric status among undergraduate students in Abia State University. The study was a descriptive crosssectional study and a multi-stage sampling technique was used to select a total of 393 undergraduate students. Data on socio demographic characteristics, food security, coping strategy, school food environment and physical activity of the students were collected using structured and validated questionnaire. Anthropometric data was collected using standard procedure. The IBM SPSS version 26.0 computer programme was used to analyze the data. Data obtained were described using frequency and percentage. Regression analysis was used to analyze the association between food security, coping strategies and anthropometric variables. The P-value was judged at < 0.05. Results showed that more than half (53.5%) of the students were between 19-22 years and majority (74.3%) of them were female. Majority (90.6%) of the students were severely food insecure, 6.4% and 1.8% were moderately and mildly food insecure respectively while 1.3% were food secure. Additionally, majority (84.5%) also had a low coping strategy, 12.7% and 2.8% had a medium and high coping strategy respectively. Majority (88.0%) of the respondents prepare their own food. Some (15.3%) of them normally get their food from a restaurant and a good number of them (49.4%) still consider getting their healthy foods from a restaurant. For most (64.1%) of the students, time, convenience and cost offood affected their ability to make health food choice on campus. Their physical activity showed that majority (91.9%) ofthem had a low physical activity. The prevalence of underweight, overweight and obesity was 11.5%, 12.7% and 5.6% respectively. Meanwhile the waist circumference and waist hip ratio of the respondents revealed that 69.7% were safe, while 30.3% were at risk. Non-significant (P judged at 0.05) relationships exist between the food security and coping strategy variables with anthropometric status. Furthermore, individual who adopt high and medium coping strategies are 1% and 2% more likely to be overweight/obese than others respectively, while having low coping strategy is associated with 1.02 of being overweight/obese. Food insecurity and the concomitant coping strategies adopted by students decreases their healthy physical activity and this may hinder their academic performance. Hence, sustainable remedial measures should be implemented to address food security among undergraduate students.