SOWING IN THE SHADOW OF THE GUN: INSURGENCY AND THE FRAGMENTATION OF WOMEN FARMERS' LIVELIHOODS IN NORTHERN BORNO, NIGERIA

Abstract

This paper examines the socioeconomic and gendered dimensions of insurgency on women farmers’ livelihoods in northern Borno State, Nigeria. Drawing on a synthesis of empirical studies, humanitarian assessments, and policy reports published between 2024 and 2026, the analysis demonstrates that the Boko Haram and Islamic State West Africa Province (ISWAP) insurgencies have systematically dismantled the agricultural foundations of women’s livelihoods through four interconnected mechanisms: forced displacement and loss of farmland, abduction and bodily insecurity, the emergence of women as primary agricultural labourers under conditions of extreme precarity, and the proliferation of survival-oriented coping strategies that entrench rather than alleviate poverty. The findings reveal that over 70% of women farmers in Borno State have lost their primary income sources, 62.2% have lost access to farmland, and 49.8% have lost livestock, with widowed and female-headed households bearing the most acute burdens. The paper argues that women farmers in northern Borno occupy a paradoxical position: they are increasingly responsible for feeding their communities while simultaneously being systematically excluded from the resources, security, and institutional support necessary to perform that role. Durable recovery requires not only gender-sensitive agricultural interventions but a fundamental restructuring of land access, security provision, and economic opportunity that recognises women’s centrality to rural food systems.