Enhancing the Access of Rural Households to Output Markets for Increased Farm Incomes

In spite of various agricultural development efforts by national and international agencies, which have brought about technological innovations such as improved crop varieties and animal breeds as well as better production techniques, the resultant increase in farm output has not necessarily translated to increased farm income for farmers in Nigeria. This is mostly due to lack of market access and other market related factors. Suffice it to say that the development efforts had hitherto concentrated on the upstream agriculture at the expense of the downstream. Thus the objective of this study is to determine the role of market factors in the translation of incremental agricultural outputs into incremental farm incomes of rural households. Data from 400 households, randomly selected from 100 villages spread across 10 Local Government Areas in the four Agricultural Development Programme (ADP) Zones of Kebbi state, Nigeria were used to model the effect of some market-specific factors on rural households' farm income using Tobit Regression analysis. The result of the analysis revealed that the distance of the farm to the market, cost of transportation, medium of sales of farm produce, fees paid for space to display farm produce in the market and lack of up-to-date market information, had significant impacts on the farm income accruable to rural farming households in the study area. In addition to these, cost of transportation contributed the highest to the transaction cost of marketing farm produce. Therefore, the policies for increasing farming households' income require an integrated approach to intervention in downstream agriculture to enhance the market access, particularly in the area of fees paid to display farm produce in the market and transportation.Farming households, output markets, farm incomes, Nigeria, Consumer/Household Economics,

The relationship between social factors and the poverty experienced by farming households in Borno state, Nigeria.

Many social characteristics of households relates to the poverty experienced by households. Hence, this study examined the poverty profile and social factors that relate with it among the farming households in Borno State, Nigeria. Using multistage sampling technique, 360 farming households were randomly sampled from 12 villages spread across six Local Government Areas of the three agro-ecological zones in the State. Primary data generated from farming households through well-structured questionnaires were mainly used for the study. The data were analysed using descriptive statistics and Foster, Greer and Thorbecke (FGT) P alpha measures of poverty. The monthly mean per adult equivalent household expenditure (MPAEHE) of the households was N2,972.77 out of which a poverty line of N1,982.84 was estimated. The FGT poverty measures showed that 62% of the farming households of the study area were poor; the average depth of the poor households from the poverty line was 44% of the poverty line, while 18% of the poor farming households were critically or severely poor. The findings revealed that poverty level among farming households increased with increase in the age of household heads, years of farming experience, household size; child dependency ratio and adult dependency ratio. On the other hand, poverty level decreased with increase in the household heads’ years of formal education and number of extension contacts per season. The study further revealed that poverty level in the study area was relatively higher among households headed by males, married persons and among households whose heads were not member of any cooperative society. Based on these findings the study recommended that policies aimed towards increasing access of households to educational facilities and provision of better family planning should be given adequate attention.Keywords: Markov games; Queuing; Virtual reality strategies; nash equilibrium, MSC CLASSIFICATION: 91A4

Promoting the adoption of innovations through participatory approaches: example from northern Nigeria

Open Access JournalParticipatory research and development approaches involving all stakeholders along the value chain have recently been hypothesized to produce quicker outcomes than the linear technology transfer model. This paper analyzed the crop yield obtained by farmers and their uptake of improved technologies in a 2009 survey, one year after the completion of project field activities. It was a multi-stakeholder project involving research, extension, farmer groups, marketers and policymakers, that operated for 4 years (2005-2008) in Borno state of Nigeria. Survey results indicated that farmers who participated in project activities’ have been successful in increasing crop yields. Both yields and per capita production of major crops were statistically significantly higher (ρ≤ 0.05) in project communities compared to non-project ones. It is also estimated that there was a decline in percentage of households in food insecurity situation in project communities. Probit regression revealed that participation in project activities had a positive and significant effect on household food security (ρ≤ 0.05). It is then concluded that development interventions that involve multiple stakeholder partnership, use of participatory research and extension approach can help increase technology uptake among resourcepoor farmers as well as increase food production and food security in a region

Measurement and determinants of food insecurity in northeast Nigeria: some empirical policy guidelines

The objectives of the study were to identify and analyze the food security measures of rural households in Borno State of Nigeria. Using multi-stage sampling techniques, 1,200 households spread across 30 communities located in four Local Government Areas of Borno State were selected through a random sample selection procedure. Cost-of-calories method and Logit model were used as analytical techniques for the study. Based on the recommended daily energy levels of 2250 kcal, a food insecurity line of N23,700.12 or US $176.87 per adult equivalent per year was obtained for the households. Over 58% of the sample households are therefore food insecure. The logit analysis revealed that the major determinants of food insecurity in the study area are household size, gender, educational level, farm size and type of household farm enterprise. A large household size was observed to affect household food insecurity. Therefore, the government should give adequate priority and attention to policy measures directed towards the provision of better family planning. In addition, there is the need for a policy to promote formal education at little or no cost as a means of enhancing efficiency in food crop production over the long-term period. In the short term, informal education could be effective, especially when targeted at farmers who have had limited formal educational opportunities. Also a policy, which provides adequately trained and equipped extension workers to disseminate improved agricultural technologies, has the potential to raise efficiency in food crop production and so enhance food security

Poverty and its determinants among farming households in West Africa: empirical evidence from Borno State, Nigeria

The study examines the extent of poverty and its determinants among farming households in Borno State of Nigeria. Primary data were obtained from 1,998 farming households using well-structured questionnaires in 2004. Mean monthly per adult equivalent household expenditure poverty line was used to characterize the households into poor and non-poor, while Tobit regression model was used to determine the factors associated with poverty experienced by the farming households in the study area. About 67% of the households were categorized as poor. The Tobit regression analysis reveals that 15 out of the 23 household livelihood-related variables included in the model had their coefficients significant at between (P<0.01) and (P<0.10), representing about 63 percent of the variables. The Tobit result reveals that increases in farm size, amount of credit, agricultural production diversification and extent of agricultural output commercialization contributed to reduce the poverty level among farming households. Poverty intensity is high among households having large size, high child dependency ratio and expenditure on education. Therefore, policy measures should aim at enhancing the rural farmers’ access to improved agricultural inputs, land and credit; thereby increasing agricultural productivity and production so as to meet home consumption and generate an increased surplus for the market

Enhancing the Access of Rural Households to Output Markets for Increased Farm Incomes

In spite of various agricultural development efforts by national and international agencies, which have brought about technological innovations such as improved crop varieties and animal breeds as well as better production techniques, the resultant increase in farm output has not necessarily translated to increased farm income for farmers in Nigeria. This is mostly due to lack of market access and other market related factors. Suffice it to say that the development efforts had hitherto concentrated on the upstream agriculture at the expense of the downstream. Thus the objective of this study is to determine the role of market factors in the translation of incremental agricultural outputs into incremental farm incomes of rural households. Data from 400 households, randomly selected from 100 villages spread across 10 Local Government Areas in the four Agricultural Development Programme (ADP) Zones of Kebbi state, Nigeria were used to model the effect of some market-specific factors on rural households' farm income using Tobit Regression analysis. The result of the analysis revealed that the distance of the farm to the market, cost of transportation, medium of sales of farm produce, fees paid for space to display farm produce in the market and lack of up-to-date market information, had significant impacts on the farm income accruable to rural farming households in the study area. In addition to these, cost of transportation contributed the highest to the transaction cost of marketing farm produce. Therefore, the policies for increasing farming households' income require an integrated approach to intervention in downstream agriculture to enhance the market access, particularly in the area of fees paid to display farm produce in the market and transportation

Analysis of technical efficiency among community-based seed producers in the savannas of Borno State, Nigeria

The study examined the socio-economic characteristics of participating seed farmers in a community-based seed production scheme organized by the project, Promoting Sustainable Agriculture in Borno State (PROSAB). In addition, it determined the technical efficiency of resource use in PROSAB seed farms. Farm level survey data from 396 seed producers who cultivated maize, cowpea, soybean, rice, groundnut and sorghum were obtained using well structured questionnaires. The production parameters were estimated simultaneously with those of the models of inefficiency effects. Using the maximum likelihood estimation technique, asymptotic parameter estimates were evaluated to describe production inputs and efficiency determinants. Based on the results of gross margin analysis, the observed profit margins across the seed types conclusively revealed that every one naira spent in cultivating the seeds, some levels of financial benefits were derived as indicated by the output/input indices. Results further revealed that labour, farm size, seed and fertilizer were the most important inputs across the six crops. Inefficiency model analysis further revealed that the duration of the crop grown and ecological region predominantly affected the seed farm level of technical efficiency in input use. A mean technical efficiency of between 55% and 58% was identified, meaning that seed production under the scheme can still be increase by about 45% and 42% using available technology. The study recommends that, given the significance of seeds that have a shorter duration to maturity, quick maturing varieties of seeds should be promoted among farmers in the study area. Also, timely access to land augmenting input like fertilizer should be ensured

Determinants and Measurements of Food Insecurity in Nigeria: Some Empirical Policy Guide

This study aims at identifying and analyzing food security measures in Borno State, Nigeria. A multi-stage sampling technique was applied on 1,200 households. Cost-of-Calories (COC) method and Logit model are used as analytical techniques for the study. Based on the recommended daily energy levels of 2,250 kcal, food insecurity line (s) for the households is N23, 700.12 or US $176.87 per adult equivalent per year. Over 58% of the sample households are therefore food insecure. Major determinants of this food insecurity factors are, household size, gender, educational level, farm size and type of household farm enterprise. Policy measures directed towards the provision of better family planning should be given adequate attention and priority by the Government in addition to improved access to education, credit facility and agricultural extension services by rural households. The poster plan begins with the introduction in section 1, followed by study objectives in section 2. The description of the study area and sampling procedure are presented in section 3, followed the analytical technique section 4. The results are presented and discussed in section 5 and policy recommendations in section 6

Analysis of food security and poverty status of rural farming households in Bauchi state, Nigeria

This study analyzed the relationship between poverty and food security among rural faming households in Bauchi State, Nigeria. Multi stage sampling was used to select respondents for the study. Questionnaire was administered to one hundred and eighty households who were randomly selected from three different Local Government Areas. The data generated were analyzed using descriptive statistic, Household dietary diversity score (HDDs), Foster, Greer and Thorbeck (FGT), Food Security Index and Logit regression model. The result on dietary diversity revealed that about 61% of the respondents had high dietary diversity while 39% had low dietary diversity. Also, the FGT analysis showed that the poverty count index (Po) for entire households was 48.22, which implies that 48% of the farming household in the study area were poor. Result on food security revealed that 33% of the respondents were food secured while 67 % were food insecure. The logit regression result revealed that the co-efficients of age, educational level andhousehold size werenegatively significant while poverty status was positive. This implies that enhancing the welfare of the farmers will probably decrease their food insecurity status. Since poverty status in this study is measured in terms of the expenditure by households, their ability to increase the expenditure on food and non-food items means that they could be food secure. The study therefore challenges both governmental and non-governmental organizations to include health education in their advocacy and extension curricula especially on the health benefits of growing and consuming diverse foods. Rural households should also be enlightened on the importance of family planning as it relates to health of the entire family.Keywords: Poverty, Food security, Rural, Farming, Bauch

Determinants and Measurements of Food Insecurity in Nigeria: Some Empirical Policy Guide

This study aims at identifying and analyzing food security measures in Borno State, Nigeria. A multi-stage sampling technique was applied on 1,200 households. Cost-of-Calories (COC) method and Logit model are used as analytical techniques for the study. Based on the recommended daily energy levels of 2,250 kcal, food insecurity line (s) for the households is N23, 700.12 or US $176.87 per adult equivalent per year. Over 58% of the sample households are therefore food insecure. Major determinants of this food insecurity factors are, household size, gender, educational level, farm size and type of household farm enterprise. Policy measures directed towards the provision of better family planning should be given adequate attention and priority by the Government in addition to improved access to education, credit facility and agricultural extension services by rural households. The poster plan begins with the introduction in section 1, followed by study objectives in section 2. The description of the study area and sampling procedure are presented in section 3, followed the analytical technique section 4. The results are presented and discussed in section 5 and policy recommendations in section 6.Determinants, Food Security, Policy Guide, Food Security and Poverty,