Ageing and Resultant Changing Gender Roles of Farmers' Involvement in Cocoa Production in Ekiti State, Nigeria

摘要

Ageing is inevitable and it will undoubtedly affect farmers' involvement in agricultural activities. The study examined the changing patterns of involvement of male and female in cocoa production activities as they age in Ekiti State, Nigeria. Multi-stage sampling technique was used to select 90 males and 50 females cocoa farmers who were below 50 years and above 50 years for the research and were interviewed with structured questionnaire. Descriptive and inferential statistics were used to analyze the data. Results showed that the mean age for males was 54 years and 52 years for females. Involvement in organisation decision making was higher for male (48.8%) than for female (29.1%). The result of the four point Likert rating scale on changing pattern of involvement with respect to age showed that both male and female were always involved in all cocoa production activities when they were less than 50 years old. "Always involved" had the least of 55.8% for choosing of farm site and highest of 81.4% for marketing, hiring of labourers and sourcing for fund. However, females had low level of involvement for all the activities when they were above 50 years, while the males had high level of involvement for only two activities; marketing and sourcing for fund when above 50 years. The t-test result revealed a difference in the level of involvement of respondents when below 50 years and above 50 years with mean of 2.8 and 1.68 respectively, (t=4.68, p 0.05). Conclusively, age affected the involvement of farmers in most cocoa production activities. As a result, recruitment of younger farmers in cocoa production was recommended.