Women Participation in Agricultural Development: A Case Study of Ikole LGA, Ekiti State

Abstract

The study investigated how rural women contribute to agricultural growth in Ikole local government area, Ekiti State, Nigeria. A two-stage random sampling method was employed. Based on their degree of rurality, ten (10) rural settlements from Ikole Local Government Area were chosen at random for the first stage. To complete the sample size of hundred (100) respondents, ten (10) rural women were also randomly selected from the rural villages in the second stage. The study employed descriptive statistics like frequency distribution, percentages, and likert scale. Findings showed that 27.0% of the rural women were between the age ranges of 36 to 45years with 78% of them being married. (23.0%) of the respondents had no formal education while 77.0% have had some form of level of education also 25% of the respondents have been on the farm for between 6-10 years. Furthermore, the rural women engaged in agricultural activities that made use of seeds, pesticides and fertilizer with mean scores of (4.47, 4.22 and 4.17) respectively. In terms of their perception of agricultural development majority of the respondents had access to credit and financial resources with a mean score of (4.56), which was viewed as crucial in enabling rural women to participate in agricultural operations also respondents viewed agriculture as profitable with a mean score of (4.38). Challenges faced by rural women included insufficient capital and safety concerns due to insecurity in the study area.