Small-Scale Crop Farmers’ Access to Farm Inputs in the North Central Zone, Nigeria

Abstract

Access to farm inputs especially land, labour, fertilizer, seeds, herbicides, pesticides, rodenticides, tractors is one of the major challenges confronting small-scale farmers in Nigeria. In view of this, a study was carried out to assess small-scale crop farmers’ access to the above eight farm inputs in the North Central Zone, Nigeria. Questionnaires were utilized for data collection while a multi-stage random sampling technique was employed to obtain 1,154 respondents from four States (Nasarawa, Benue, Kwara, and Plateau States) selected for the study. Descriptive statistics and two-way mixed ANOVA were used for data analysis. Mean separation was done at 5% probability level. The result generally revealed that the farmers’ access to farm inputs was moderate but the farmers in Nasarawa State significantly (p < .05) had more access to all the eight farm inputs compared to farmers in Benue, Kwara and Plateau States. The mean responses showed that land was the most accessible farm input while tractor services were the least accessible farm input across the states. Mean separation showed that access to land was significantly (p < .05) higher than access to other farm inputs. Based on the findings, the study concludes that the farmers’ access to farm inputs was significantly (p<.05) dependent on the nature of the input (input type) and the location of the farmer in the North Central Zone of Nigeria. It is recommended that the Government of Nigeria at all levels should encourage the development of more indigenous agro-based industries that can supply the farm inputs especially tractor services and fertilizer to the small scale farmers at a reduced cost.