Impact Assessment of Fadama III Group Participation on Food Security Status of Rural Households in South West, Nigeria

One of the major challenges facing Nigeria is food insecurity which has deprived her citizens of meeting up their daily dietary energy supplies in the time past. Fadama III program was set up and implemented to curb these challenges. However, this study empirically examined the impact of the Fadama III group participation program on food security status of the rural households in South West, Nigeria. A total of 600 respondents were sampled. Primary data were used for the study which was collected through a well-structured and pretested questionnaire. The data collected were analyzed using descriptive statistics, Probit regression, Food security index and double-hurdle model. The result of the descriptive statistics showed that the mean age of the participant and non-participant was 46±16.25 and 46±16.17 respectively. About 46.1% and 23.6% of the participants of Fadama III program in South West Nigeria were involved in crop production and livestock production respectively. The decision to participate in Fadama III program in South West Nigeria was significantly influenced by gender (p<0.10), occupation (p<0.01), extension contacts (p<0.01) and awareness (p<0.05). Based on the food security line created, majority (84.3%) of the participants of Fadama III program were food secure as against 42% of the non-participants that were food secure. The result of the probit regression (first hurdle) showed that gender, farm size, non-farm income, membership in association and income from Fadama III program were significant positive determinants of food security status of participants of Fadama III program while gender and non-farm income were significant positive determinants of food security status of non-participants in South West, Nigeria where household size was a negative significant determinant. The result of truncated regression(second hurdle)also showed that the estimated coefficient of correlation between the selection equation (determinant function) and the outcome equation (per capital expenditure function) of 0.129 for participants of Fadama III program is positive and significant at 1% which implies that participants in Fadama III program have higher capital consumption expenditure than random household sample. Since participation in Fadama III program leads to increased food security status, such community developmental program should be designed in the future in such a way that it will accommodate a large number of potential farmers so as to improve their wellbeing and food security