Assessment of Food Security and Livelihood Status of Rural Households Adopting Improved Rice Varieties in Kwara and Niger States of Nigeria

Abstract

The study assessed the food security and livelihood status of rural households adopting improved rice varieties in Kwara and Niger States of Nigeria. Sample sizes of three hundred and ninety four rice farmers were selected using multi-stage sampling method. Structured questionnaire complimented with interview were used for data collection. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, food security index, livelihood status index and Simpson index of diversity. The findings revealed 83.3% and 82.7% of rice farmers adopted FARO 44 and FARO 54 respectively. Also, 92.1% were food secured while 65.5% were of moderate livelihood status. The Simpson Diversification Index of rice farmers in the study area was 0.219, indicating low degree. Thus, it is recommended that rice farmers should diversify into other income generating activities in order to enhance their livelihood status and food security status. Also, research institutes should ensure farmers' access improved rice varieties with affordable prices and right time in order to enhance their livelihood and food security status.

Livelihood Status of Rice Contract Farmers in Benue State of Nigeria

“…That is to say that the factors that meet the cut-off criterion with Eigen-values greater than 1 are generally considered satisfactory. The extracted factors and their respective factor loadings exclude those whose absolute loading value was less than 0.40 according to Kaiser"s rule of thumb (Usman et al, 2021). Economic/institutional factors Entries in Table 5 showed that the first factor was loaded very high with an Eigen-value of 17.52050 and 78.7% variance of the militating factors.…”