Contribution of urban agriculture to household income and poverty alleviation in south west Nigeria: a multidimensional approach

Abstract

With the recent rise in the poverty status in the country and increase in the population of urban dwellers living in poverty despite different government intervention programmes, this study thus sets out to examine the contribution of urban agriculture to household income and how it helps to alleviate poverty among urban households. A multi-stage sampling technique was adopted in the selection of 209 respondents. Data were obtained on their socioeconomic characteristics, type of urban agriculture engaged in and the returns from such activities, the contribution of returns from urban agriculture to total household income, household asset base, house ownership and housing condition among others. The data obtained were analyzed using descriptive statistics, budgetary analysis, fussy set and Ordinary Regression Analysis. The result of the analysis indicates that the mean age, household size, years of formal education and experience in agriculture is 43.18±13.07 years, 5.34±2.94, 14.98±2.03 and 6.01±3.24 respectively. The result of the socio-economic characteristics of the respondents further shows that majority (60.1%) of the respondents are married and are members of social organization (59.8%). The mean profit from vegetable production is 370 per Kg while the mean profit from poultry production is 679.99 per kg of bird. The result of the analysis further shows that profit realized from urban agricultural activity contributes 13.7% to 100% with an average 46.9% to total household income. The result of the poverty analysis reveals that 39.7% of the households are poor. Further decomposition of the poverty status of households based on their agricultural activities reveals that households that are into livestock rearing have the majority (69.3%) of their respondents belonging to the non-poor group while the majority of those that are into vegetable production are living in poverty. The study, therefore, established that urban agriculture contributes to household income and invariably enhance welfare status of urban households by alleviating poverty among them. Urban households should, therefore, be synthesized to take up agriculture as a livelihood strategy. In addition, government and other stakeholders should find a means of enhancing the value of the output of crops especially vegetables so as to encourage urban households to go into its cultivation so as to increase its contribution to total income in urban centers.