Nigeria has abundant land and water resources to embark on irrigation schemes to ensure all year round rice production. Additional yield to annual rice production through dry season farming in 2012 in 10 pilot States of the country was found to be over 1 million metric tonnes. This shows that an intensive and consistent irrigated rice production scheme will set Nigeria on a pathway to rice self-sufficiency thereby bringing an end to the gross loss in foreign exchange due to importation and smuggling of the commodity. The study reviewed irrigation subsector in Nigeria, and revealed that the prospects of achieving rice self sufficiency through irrigation farming is hampered by some major challenges namely-underdeveloped subsector promoted by fragmented, inconsistent and unimplemented policies, multiple water regulatory institutions with overlapping and duplicating mandate and poor management system. Other challenges include-the absence of a viable market for local rice as well as high cost of labour inputs, irrigation equipments and other operating costs. The study concluded that for Nigeria irrigation potentials to be harnessed towards rice self-sufficiency there is need to amend policies on irrigation and water resources, create conducive market for local producers and provide subsidized and appropriate farm implements.

ABSTRACT

The prevalence of child labour use in the agricultural sector has been widely reported however, the intensity of its use is most times masked and marred by the informal and culturally ingrained nature of peasant agriculture. The study aims at understanding the dimensions and causes of child labour among rural farm households in Nigeria. A multistage sampling technique was used to select 128 rural households for the survey; a total of 352 children (5-17years) were interviewed to elicit first hand data for the study. Structured questionnaire was used to collect data on child farm work hours, household size, income, farm size, distance of home to school and other relevant socioeconomic characteristics. Analytical techniques used were measures of central tendency and dispersion, and censored Tobit regression model. Results show that the average age of children is 10 years and many of these children (67.3%) are reported to be living with their biological parents. While less than a third (26%) of the children work in paid and non-family farms, the average weekly work hours per child was found to be 31.31 which increases with the age of the child. With reference to loss in school time due to farm work, it was found that rural children in farm households sacrificed an average of 12.9 hours per week (42.9%) of school time to work on the farm; this varies from season to season. Age and education level of the household head, farm and household size, lack of child-level schools in the community, distance of home to school, sex of child, absence of tarmac roads to community and proximity of households to major roads were identified as factors that influence the prevalence and intensity of child farm labour use. The study concluded that rural infrastructure development and households' economic empowerment initiatives are central to child labour reduction strategies.

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