The Experience and Response of Co-operative Societies to Poverty Eradication in Eruwa in Ibarapa Region of South- Western Nigeria

The subject matter of this study is the experience and response of co-operative societies to poverty eradication in Eruwa. Poverty is a social condition characterized by the inadequacy of access to basic human needs (food and non-food) for the maintenance of socially acceptable minimum standard of living by majority in a given society. The study area consists of 6 political wards from which three hundred respondents were randomly selected for the study. The primary data utilized for this research work were collected through questionnaires and in-depth interviews. The secondary data were collected through some sources like maps, journals, textbooks and internet. The questionnaires were analyzed, using Statistic Package for Social Sciences (SPSS). One sample test was also used in the analysis. The study identified the educational attainment, indigenous assets, pattern of saving, access to credit facilities for income, and investment priority of the respondents. However, the majority of the respondents believed that there has been improvement in the area of occupation, self help project, income generation, and standard of living among others. Therefore, it was recommended that more participation in cooperative societies should be encouraged, people should be more involved in local administration than hitherto recorded, and the local administrator should embark on awareness campaign to encourage the daily and weekly workers to improve on their saving pattern, bottom-up approach to rural poverty alleviation programmes. Keywords: - Experience, Cooperative Society, Poverty eradication