Socio-Economic Determinants of Savings in Cooperatives by Farmers of Selected Agricultural Group Lending Schemes in Anambra State, Nigeria

The study examined how the socio-economic factors of farmer-members of cooperative in agricultural group lending scheme influence their abilities to make financial savings with their cooperatives. The study was conducted in Anambra State, Nigeria. Data were collected from a total of 296 farmer-members of cooperative societies randomly selected from National Programme for Food Security (NPFS) and Rural Finance Institution Building Programme (RUFIN) agricultural group lending schemes purposively selected for the study. Ten selected farmers,’ socio-economic factors were regressed on deposit mobilized with the cooperatives by the farmers. Frequency distribution, percentages and means were descriptive statistics used in analyzing data. The lead function from regression analysis showed that 43.08 percent of the total variation in deposit mobilization was explained by the 10 socio-economic variables included in the model. The significant variables affecting deposit mobilization in cooperatives by farmers in the group leading scheme were value of Assets, off farm income, age of household head, level of farm diversification and total value of farmer’s loan. More so, the study found that the financial savings mobilized by farmer-members within their cooperatives were meagre averaging N1595 and made usually for purpose of securing loans