DETERMINANTS OF SAVINGS BEHAVIOUR AMONG MEMBERS OF FARMERS COOPERATIVE SOCIETIES IN ANAMBRA STATE

SOURCE:

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

CONTRIBUTORS:

Agbasi, O. E.
Akubilo, C. J. C.

ABSTRACT:

Nigerian farmers are faced with numerous problems that hinder them from attaining their full potential in food production. Majority of them operate small and fragmented farm land using crude implements for production as mostly seen in Anambra state. They have to contend with high input prices, low mechanism, high transportation cost, infertile land, pest and diseases etc. In the mist of these, farmers have resorted to pooling their resources together and work as members of one cooperative society or the other to enhance their farm productions. One of the economic obligations of members of the cooperative society is savings. In cooperatives, people save money in the form of monthly contribution which is loaned to the members on demand. This leads to enhancement of the productive capacity of many rural farmers. The saving behaviours are measured in line with Marginal Propensity to save and Average Propensity to Save. The main purpose of the study was to examine the determinant of savings behaviours among members of farmers cooperative societies in Anambra State. Specifically, the study determined relationships between the farmers’ total income and their total savings, members’ duration and marginal propensity to save, members’ duration and average propensity to save, income diversification and savings deposit of members in the cooperative societies. It further examined the predictive powers of socio-economic characteristics of cooperative members in their total savings. Correlation design was adopted for the study. Five research questions guided the study and five null hypotheses were tested at 0.05 level of significance. The area of the study was Anambra State. The population of the study consisted of 3,557 farmers and sample size was 333. The instrument for data collection was a structured questionnaire. It was duly validated by experts in measurement and evaluation and co-operative economics. It was also subjected to reliability test using Crombach alpha method to test for the internal consistency. It has a coefficient alpha of 0.86. Frequency distribution table, percentages and Pearson correlation coefficient were used to analyze data in respect of research questions, while multiple regression models were used to test the null hypotheses. The findings of the study indicated that there is a significant relationship between income of members and their total savings. Membership duration in cooperative society is significantly related to their Marginal propensity to Save (MPS), and their Average propensity to save (APS), while income diversification of members has significant relationship with their savings deposit in cooperative, among others. The result obtained from the study also revealed that some socio-economic characteristics are related to the amount of savings by cooperative farmers. The study concludes that there are some major determinants of saving behaviours. Based on the findings of the study, recommendations were made.