SOCIO-ECONOMIC DIMENSIONS AND CREDIT SUPPLY TO POULTRY FARMERS IN ODEDA LOCAL GOVERNMENT AREA OF OGUN STATE NIGERIA

SOCIO-ECONOMIC DIMENSIONS AND CREDIT SUPPLY TO POULTRY FARMERS IN ODEDA LOCAL GOVERNMENT AREA OF OGUN STATE NIGERIA

ABSTRACT

The Agricultural sector in Nigeria has remained one of the largest contributors to the gross domestic product of the nation’s economy contributing an average of 39% of GDP. Since the beginning of the millennium, over 80% of the country’s population living in the rural areas is directly or indirectly dependent on agriculture for livelihood. “NBS 2005” Livestock sector plays a crucial role in rural economy and livelihood, and access to credit has both direct and indirect effects on farm production. This has examined the factors affecting farmers’ participation in credit market and how socio-economic dimensions of poultry farmers their suitability to access credit. Variables for this study included household, collateral, level of education, years of experience and farm size against credit supply.

Descriptive and inferential methods were used to analyse the data collected from one hundred (100) poultry farmers within Odeda Local government of Ogun state Nigeria. Instrument use for data collection was poultry farmers’ access to credit questionnaire (PFACQ).

The result shows that Household size and collateral have a significant impact on access to credit from formal and informal financial institution (t-statistics ≥ 1.64 in absolute value terms) while level of education; years of experience and farm size are not statistically significant on credit supply since t-statistics ≤ 1.64.

The study concluded that credit supply was not dependent on the years of experience, level of education or farm size of poultry farmers but to a certain level, dependent on the Household and the collateral of these farmers. Therefore it is recommended that the government should make loans available to poultry farmers in Nigeria irrespective of their exposure in knowledge, in the business or the available facilities for the poultry farming.

Keywords:     Poultry farming, Credit supply, level of education, years of experience, collateral