ASSESSMENT OF EFFICIENT UTILIZATION OF PRODUCTION INPUTS AMONG WOMEN RICE FARMERS IN NIGER STATE, NIGERIA

ABSTRACT

The study assessed the efficient utilization of production inputs among women rice farmers in Niger State, Nigeria. A multi-stage sampling procedure was used to select 195 women rice farmers and data collected through structured questionnaire were analysed using frequency distribution, means, percentages, Cobb-Douglass production function and resource-use efficiency model. Results obtained show that respondents in the study area were mostly in their productive age (36 years, averagely), married (86.7%) with formal education (63.6%) and household size of 6 persons averagely. The respondents mostly utilized fertilizer

(̅X=142.6kg/ha), seed (X̅=31.4kg/ha) and agrochemicals (X̅=1.3 litres/ha). The farmlands were relatively small with mean of 1.2 hectares and mean labour usage of 53 man-days in rice

production. The efficient utilization of production inputs was influenced by Labour (1.67), fertilizers (2.17), seed (-2.91) and agrochemicals (-1.68) with MVP to MPC ratios less than unity for land (0.31), labour (0.16) and agrochemicals (0.20), equal to unity for seed (1) and greater than unity for fertilizer application (1.5). Tobit regression analysis result on the determinants of efficient utilization of production inputs showed that formal education (2.14), household size (-2.07), extension contact (1.66), goal of farming (-1.84) and access to credit (1.72) significantly influenced efficient utilization of production inputs. The pseudo R2 value of 0.5260, thus implying that the model had strong explanatory power for this analysis. However, women participation in rice production were constrained by high costs of

production inputs (̅X=2.64), inadequate inputs supply (̅X=2.55), difficulty in accessing loans by  women  farmers  (̅X=2.53),  poor  transport  network  (X̅=2.48),  lack  of  transport  facilities

(̅X=2.47) and pest and diseases (̅X=2.45 ranked among the top six (6) prominent constraint faced by the women in the study area. The production resources in the study area were found

not to be efficiently utilized since most of the production inputs were either over or under- utilized. It is therefore recommended that for optimal use of resources in rice production, quantities of fertilizer application should be increased while land, labour and agrochemicals should be reduced.