By Ojugbele Omotunde
Over the years, women in Nigeria have established more defined roles in agriculture. Nigerian women involved in agricultural production, processing and utilization. They play a significant roles in food and agriculture in the country.
According to the Federal Ministry of Agriculture, women account for 75% of the farming population in Nigeria, working as farm managers, and suppliers of labour. They produce the bulk of food for domestic consumption and they are the drivers of food processing, marketing and preservation.
Generally, the extent of of gender involvement in agricultural production varies across ethnic groups in the country. Nigerian women farmers are known to work alongside with their male counterparts with some clear distinctions in activities between them.
In some cases, the men engaged in the tedious tasks such as land clearing and felling of trees, gathering and burning of bush, and making ridges. The women on their part participated actively in planting. In addition, they also participated in weeding, harvesting, on-farm processing and selling of farm produce.
However, despite this enormous tasks, women in agricultural business in Nigeria encountered numerous challenges such as limited access to land, credit facilities, farm inputs, crop insurance, training and advice among others. Transportation of their farm produce from their farm to the markets is another challenge coupled with insecurity, invasion of farms by herders and their cattle, outright robbery and kinapping on the farm.
A report on challenges confronting women farmers in the country has it that they have just 14% holding rights on farm where they farm, in spite of their strategic roles in food production. Additionally, government agricultural programmes hardly focuses on supporting them.
NatureNews investigations revealed that, if women farmers in the country have the same access to finance, land, technology, and training advice as their men counterparts, they will contribute significantly towards food surplus in Nigeria.
The key constraints affecting women farmers’ ability to improve efficiency in agriculture include access to finance. As it stand today, women farmers in the country receive less than 10% of the credit offered to small-scale farmers. Women farmers are deterred from applying for formal loans because of the complexity of the administrative process, unsuitable loan sizes and credit rates. Hence, women are not found in farm clusters.
Access to inputs is another challenge before women in agriculture in Nigeria. Due to poor financing, women farmers are unable to access agricultural inputs such as improved seedlings nd fertilizer. They have indicated that they are unable to use inputs due to high cost in the open market.
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Similarly, access to land is a great challenge to women in agriculture in the country.
According to the 2012 ‘Gender in Nigeria’ report by the British Council, women own 4% of land in the North East, and just over 10% in the South East and South-South.
The report showed that less than 10% of Nigerian women own land. The lack of land ownership by women in agricultural sector significantly reduces the chances for women’s access to financing because of he need for collateral, NatureNews findings revealed.
Esther Samuel is a women farmer in Minna, capital of Niger State. She planted millet, maize, potatoes, groundnuts, guinea corn and cashew.
According to her, she has been struggling to improve on her farming without much progress owing to financial constraint to buy sufficient fertilizers nd manure. That aside, she said she is used to trekking to and from her farm everyday, causig her fatigue and most times, she won’t be able to return to the farm the next day. Esther explained that she have many dependants because she is a widow.
Janet Ezeikel operates a poultry in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Abuja. In her interaction with NatureNews, she said insufficient fund is her major challenge noting that a bag of feed can only last four consecutive days. ” I am a married woman with children. The situation of things in the country today is a big challenge to people like me in poultry business. Cost of feed for the chicken has risen and the chicken need to be fed as deem fit or they die,” she said.
According to her, she is into poultry on full time adding that the time and energy she spent in taking care of the chicken is more than that used in taking care of her children at home. ”Poultry farming is a tedious job; sudden lost of chicken in a poultry business is a big challenge to owners of the poultry,” she noted.
Generally, women farmers are rarely connected with agriculture export crops such as cocoa, cotton, rubber, but rather involved with production of food crops such as cowpea, melon, cassava, pepper, maize and vegetables. They also took part in small scale animal production including small ruminants, poultry and aquaculture.
Women in agriculture sector call on the federal and state government to come up with agricutural policies that will encourage them to put in more efforts towards increased agricultural productivity.
The women farmers believe they possess more knowledge of traditional water adaptation processes that can enhance crop yield and reduce the effect of adverse conditions that commonly affect agricultural activities such as flooding.
According to the National Bureau of Statistics (NBS),the agricultural sector accounts for 23.78% of Nigeria’s Gross Domestic Produce (GDP), which would not be possible without great input by the women in the sector particularly where they are in majority.
