Need Assessment of Farmers in Crop-Livestock Production Systems in Ido Local Government Area, Oyo State, Nigeria

Abstract

Agricultural projects and programmes funded by governments and donor agencies often failed to achieve the desired set objective(s) at the system levels. The study tries to assess the existing production practices with a view of coming up with a consensus farmer need in a crop-livestock production system at Ido Local Government Area (LGA). The study used a three-stage-sampling technique to elicit information from 225 respondents. Ido Local Government Area was purposively selected for the study. Three cells were randomly selected for the research, three villages were randomly selected in each cell and twenty-five farmers were selected using the snowball selection technique. The data obtained from the Participatory Rural Appraisal were analyzed using descriptive statistics. The pairwise ranking tool helped in determining the importance of the identified problems from the FGD in the study area. The researcher identified the following problems (Pb) from the focus group discussion; inadequate capital for livestock production (Pb1), poor housing for livestock (Pb2), inadequate nutrition for livestock (Pb3), diseases of crops (Pb4), livestock and predatory attack on crops (Pb5). The pairwise comparison of percentage of Pb1 versus (vs) Pb2 was 80/20%, Pb1 vs Pb3 was 68/32%, Pb1 vs Pb4 was 80/20%, Pb1 vs Pb5 was 12/88%, Pb2 vs Pb3 was 68/32%, Pb2 vs Pb4 was 20/80%, Pb2 vs Pb5 was 20/80%, Pb3 vs Pb4 was 32/68%, Pb3 vs Pb5 was 20/80%, vs Pb4 vs Pb5 was 20/80% respectively. The ultimate farmers’ problem in crop-livestock production systems (CLPS) that needs immediate intervention and technical assistance was inadequate capital as perceived from the responses of the farmers.