Fresh pepper, including the variety known as rodo, is not among the 21 product-and-unit lines in the Ministry of Agriculture and Food Systems market survey for the week of 14 August 2026. FoodPrices holds no mean, no market range and no weekly movement for it. The figures below belong to the outlets named beside them and carry the dates those outlets published.
A Market That Has Moved in Multiples
Pepper has recorded some of the sharpest swings in the Nigerian food basket. BusinessDay reported in 2025 that a 25kg bag in Lagos averaged ₦120,000, four times its ₦30,000 level in February of the previous year, and that in Kano a 25kg bag had risen 567% year-on-year to ₦100,000 from ₦15,000. The same report quoted a Mile 12 trader describing a journey to Kano that failed to secure even ten bags, and the Kano chairman of the All Farmers Association attributing the scarcity to pest damage that had destroyed most pepper farms. Greenhouse operations were not spared, according to a Kano Chamber of Commerce grower quoted in the same piece.
Seasonality Cuts Both Ways
Pepper is a rainy season crop in open-field production, which means supply and price tend to move inversely with the calendar rather than with the wider staples market. Daily Trust reported in May 2026 that a basket of cayenne pepper in Abuja markets had moved from a range of ₦7,000 to ₦9,000 up to a range of ₦12,000 to ₦13,500, with traders citing transport costs and festival demand. Legit.ng reported traders in 2025 saying flooding had cut available quantities of tomatoes and peppers while a collapsed bridge raised the cost of moving trucks from north to south, with the national president of the tomato growers association noting that such increases are normal for seasonal produce at that point in the year.
Households Adjust Before Prices Do
Food Business Middle East and Africa reported in June 2026 that families were substituting tatashe and pepper as tomato prices climbed. Substitution of that kind moves demand between products that are not tracked in the same survey, which is one practical reason a Lagos price line for pepper would improve the picture the weekly roundup gives.
What Would Change This
Pepper belongs in the catalogue if the platform wants to report the perishables that drive the largest short-run swings in a Lagos food budget. Until it is added, pepper coverage here stays in context form and carries no FoodPrices price.
Live prices: foodprices.ng/real-time-prices