LAND TENURE SYSTEM AND SUSTAINABLE LIVELIHOOD AMONG WOMEN CASSAVA FARMERS IN SOUTH WEST, NIGERIA

Abstract

The study analyzed the land tenure system and sustainable livelihood among women cassava farmers in Southwest, Nigeria. The study was carried out in Ogun and Ondo States. The study data obtained through structured questionnaire and focus group discussion (FDG) were elicited from three hundred (300) respondents selected across the study areas using the multistage sampling technique. The data were analysed using descriptive and inferential statistics. Findings revealed that respondents had a mean age of 47.4 years, 82% had at least primary school education, 85.3% were married with a mean household size of 5 persons, mean farming experience was 15.4 years and mean farm size was 1.4ha. Majority (89.0 %) of the respondents had access to adequate land and 71.3% were not land tenure secured. The result of Heckman probit model showed that income (p < 0.003), farm size (p < 0.000), social group (p < 0.068), primary occupation (p < 0.002), number of dependants (p < 0.035) and proximity to processing industry (p < 0.042) were positively significant to access to land while household size (p <0.019), access to extension (p < 0.001), cassava output (p < 0.000) and proximity to market (p < 0.059) were negatively significant. Findings also shows that marital status (p < 0.000), education status (p < 0.026), access to credit (p < 0.000), access to extension agent (p < 0.001), farming experience (p < 0.008), farm size (p < 0.010) and proximity to processing industry (p < 0.00) were positively significant to land security status of respondents. The results of Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) indicated that 12.8% of the land secured farmers were technically inefficient with the mean efficiency of 0.55 apiece for Constant Returns to Scale Technical Efficiency (CRSTE) and scale efficiency. For the CRSTE and scale efficiency of non-land secured farmers, 3.74% of the interviewed farmers were both technically and scale efficient with the mean efficiency of 0.38 and 0.39 respectively. Independent sampled t-test revealed that there was a significant difference between the efficiency and land security status of the women cassava farmers. The result of Multinomial Logit (MNL) regression model analysis revealed that the coefficients of marital status (p < 0.052), access to credit (p < 0.013), costs of equipment (p < 0.031), access to extension service (p < 0.061), cassava output (p < 0.013) and farming experience (p < 0.048) were statistically significant in determining respondents having two sources of income; coefficients of household size (p < 0.040), and access to credit (p < 0.0.025) were statistically significant in influencing the probability of adopting three sources of income while household size (p < 0.073) and access to credit (p < 0.033) were significantly responsible for the choice of four income sources in the study area. The result of the Ordinary Least Square (OLS) analysis showed that marital status (p < 0.058), number of extension visits (p < 0.040), farming experience (p < 0.011), farm size (p < 0.047), labour cost (p < 0.024), transportation (p < 0.028) and belonging to social group (p < 0.040) were statistically significant in affecting the farmers’ income in the study area. The major constraints encountered by cassava farmers were: shortage of land for cassava production, unsecured land ownership, poor road network, inadequate capital, and environmental hazards. Poor road network (1st) was considered the most serious problem being encountered on cassava production and the least (12th) identified constraint was problem of pest and disease. The study concluded that women cassava farmers had access to adequate land for cultivating cassava but not many of the respondents were land secured, while the land secured women cassava farmers have higher production efficiency than the non-land secured category. The study therefore, recommended that land ownership system in rural areas should be reviewed to encourage more women access to large cultivable land, and enhance their tenure security towards increased agricultural production for sustainable livelihood. This study therefore, contributes to the existing body of knowledge by investigating and providing information on the land tenure system that exist among women cassava farmers in South Western Nigeria with particular focus on Ogun and Ondo states exploring their land tenure security status and also assessed their production efficiencies in cassava farming enterprise. The study is further unique in the choice of analytical tools that were adopted in the analysis of data collected during the research such as Data Envelopment Analysis, Quantile Regression Model and Heckman Probit Model. These tools were not found to have been applied in similar studies conducted earlier.