Livelihood Diversification Among Rural Forest Dwellers in Akwa-Ibom,Nigeria: A Multinomial Logit Approach

Abstract

This study was carried out to determine the factors influencing the involvement  of some rural forest communities’ livelihood  diversification strategies in Akwa Ibom State, Nigeria. The multi-stage sampling technique was used to select 100 respondents for this study. The first stage involved the purposive selection of three local government areas (LGAs): Esit Eket, Mbo, and Ibeno, where the forest reserve is located. The second stage involved the random selection of ten villages from the three LGAs. The third stage comprised the random selection of ten respondents from each of the selected ten villages. Descriptive statistics such as frequency, percentage, as well as inferential statistics such as the multinomial logistic regression were used in the study. The results of the multinomial logistic regression show that total household income, household size, farm size, educational qualification, access to extension service, farming experience and forest availability were the factors that significantly influenced the respondents’ choice of livelihood strategies in the study area. Policies that will encourage diversification in order to broaden opportunities that will lead to increase in income and improve rural household livelihood should be encouraged.

Key words: Livelihood, Strategies, Akwa Ibom, Multinomial, Forest dwellers