Assessment of Impact of Anchor Borrowers’ P...

Assessment of Impact of Anchor Borrowers’ Programme on Small-Scale Rice Farmers in North East, Nigeria

Author Name : Ago Garba Saleh , Idu E. E., Fadiji T. O.

ABSTRACT The study investigated impact of Anchor Borrowers’ Programme (ABP) on small-scale rice farmers in North-East, Nigeria, with a view to identifying whether objectives of the programme have been achieved or not in the study area. The research was delineated to four States comprising of Adamawa, Bauchi, Gombe and Taraba States. The study focused on both wet and dry seasons rice farmers participating in ABP between 2021 and 2022 with a population of 20, 890 in the zone. A multi-stage sampling and Taro Yamane statistical techniques were used to determine a sample size of 492 respondents. Also, 360 respondents were interviewed through a Focused Group Discussion (FGD). Data were collected through a structured questionnaire. Results indicated that before participating in ABP, output of rice farmers was 3.375 tonnes/hectare (33.75 bags of 100kg bags) but after participating in ABP the output was 5.164 tonnes/hectare (51.64 bags of 100kg bags), indicating an increase of 1.789 tonnes/hectare (17.89 bags of 100kg bags) or 34% increase in output. Also, rice harvested during dry season was greater than that of wet season with0.7 tonnes/hectare (6.3 bags of 100kg. Similarly, results from Focus Group Discussion (FGD) indicated that before ABP farmers’ output was 2.8 tonnes/hectare (28 bags of 100kg) and increased to 3.5 tonnes/hectare (35 bags of 100kg) after participating in ABP. During wet season, rice output of beneficiaries was more than that of none-beneficiaries with 1.13 tonnes/hectare or 10.2 bags of 100kg/hectare. It was recommended that government should expand ABP to cover more rice farmers, focus more on transforming small-scale rice farmers to medium or large scale in the study area.