SOURCE:

Faculty: Management Sciences
Department: Co-opreative Economics And Management

CONTRIBUTORS:

Okafor, E.O
Akubilo, C.J.C

ABSTRACT:

Lack of women empowerment has been considered the bane of the economy of many African countries, particularly Nigeria. The indispensable role of women in any development calls for eradication of barriers to women empowerment at all levels. This study examined agricultural cooperatives and its role in empowering women economically in South-East, Nigeria. The objective of the study were to assess the effect of farm support activities on rural income, determine the effect of farm support activities on farm output, assess the effect of years of membership on profitability of farm operations and determine the effect of cooperative membership on livelihood sustainability. Three hundred and seventy members out of 4921 agricultural cooperative members were selected as sample size. Structured questionnaire were used to collect data from the study area. The design of the study was survey research design. Descriptive statistics including mean, frequency distribution were used to analyze data. A Multiple regression analysis was employed. The chosen model is linear and of the Ordinary Least Square (OLS).To test hypotheses (i), Pearson correlation was used, while in hypothesis (ii) Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) statistics from the Multiple Regression Analysis was used. Findings revealed that there is indeed a significant relationship between cooperative support activities and rural income, with Pearson’s correlation of 0.098 which was significant at 0.05levels. Also, cooperative support activities have significant effects on the farm output of members with estimates of R2 = 0.319 and Adj. R2 = 0.313 suggesting that three variables in the model collectively accounted for over 31% of the variations in farm outputs as reported by the various cooperatives. F ratio was significant at 5% level. Years of membership/ participation in agricultural cooperatives have significant effects on profitability of farm operations of members. Finally, cooperative experience in agricultural cooperative has significant effect on livelihood sustainability with F ratio of 6.202. This affirms the theory of collective action to which the work was anchored. Agricultural cooperative are organized, incorporated; and collective action theory directly or indirectly relates to the seven internationally recognized principles of cooperatives. The study recommended that women in the area should be encouraged to form or join cooperative for enhance income and poverty reduction.