Poverty and rural livelihood diversification among farming households in southwest Nigeria

The tendency for rural households to engage in multiple occupations is often remarked, but few attempts have been made to link this behaviour in a systematic way to rural poverty. This study attempted to contribute to knowledge by empirically relating poverty status to livelihood diversification in southwest Nigeria. This study utilized data obtained from a cross-sectional survey of 213 farming households in Yewa North and Odeda Local Government Areas of Ogun State. The survey was conducted in 2007. The data were analyzed using poverty depth analysis (FGT class) and Tobit regression model. The study revealed that the incidence of poverty revealed that the proportion of the farming households whose per capita expenditures fell below the poverty line was 47 percent. The depth of poverty depicted that severity of poverty in the study area was 8 percent. Aside farming, eleven livelihood activities (hunting, fishing, trading, hired labour services on other farms, processing of farm produce, artisanship, non-timber forest exploration, community service, civil service, private sector employment and other paid employment) were engaged in by the farming households. Furthermore, income generated from livelihood activities was negatively related to the probability of a household being poor suggesting that engagement in livelihood activities reduces the risk of poverty among the farming household in the study area. The results also showed that sex of the household head, household size, dependency ratio, land area owned by the household, income generated from livelihood activities and hunting as a means of livelihood significantly determined the poverty status of farming household in the study area. Policies aimed at increasing the income generation ability of the household should be strongly considered. Finally, the favoured livelihood activities (hunting, trading and artisanship) should be thoroughly examined to enable policy makers know the right point of intervention.