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Dec 31, 2020Keywords:
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EFFECT OF ACCESS TO MICROCREDIT ON FOOD SECURITY STATUS OF FARM HOUSEHOLDS IN NIGER-DELTA, NIGERIA
Abstract
The study examined the effect of access to micro credit on the food security status of farm households in Niger
Delta region of Nigeria. Multistage sampling technique was used to select 384 respondents stratified into
beneficiaries and non-beneficiaries of micro credit schemes. Primary data was used for the study and analyzed
using frequencies, percentages and multiple discriminant function. The most patronized sources of micro credit
were the informal sources (65.82%), while the patronage of the formal sources was 34.17% in the region. The
dependent variable-food security status, comprise of three groups namely, marginal food security, low food
security, and very low food security. Based on factor loadings, the strongest predictor was borrowing money for
farming (0.749), and the weakest predictor was remittance status (0.308). The canonical correlation of 0.597
implied that 35.64% of the variation in the grouping variable was explained by the discriminators included in the
model. The chi-square statistic (60.4) of Wilk's lambda was significant (p<0.01), implying that discriminant
function was appropriate and significant. Therefore, micro credit access was a major determinant of which food
security typology the small-scale farmers in the study area belonged to and had effect on the food security status
of farm households. Therefore, government, development organizations, agricultural cooperatives and
individuals among others should set up micro credit schemes to support farmers in agricultural production.
