Determinants of Rural Women’s Participation in Community Development Activities in Akoko South-West Local Government Area, Ondo State, Nigeria

Abstract

In order to scale-up the economic, social, cultural and political development in the rural areas of Nigeria, Federal, State and Local governments have embarked on several poverty alleviation programmes and other social welfare schemes. However, in many countries, women are prevented from working for socio-cultural reasons. Women face inequalities and challenges that hinder their access to jobs, training, education, properties, land, financial and non-financial opportunities. This study therefore focused on rural women’s participation in community development activities in Akoko South-West Local Government Area, Ondo state, Nigeria. Multi-stage sampling procedures were adopted to select 120 respondents for the study. Five objectives and one hypothesis were formulated for the study. Well-structured questionnaire/interview schedule was used to elicit information from the respondents. Findings from the study revealed that there is low participation of rural women in community development activities which may result from the constraints the women faced in their participation such as poor community cooperation and dialogue, lack of sustainability of projects, inadequate access to credit and low-income base, poor infrastructures especially good road networks, poor monitoring and evaluation. The results of the hypothesis revealed that family size, years of experience, marital status and income at p< 0.005 had effect on the rural women’s participation respectively. It was therefore recommended that efforts should be made to promote community cooperation and dialogue among rural women through the organisation of regular meetings and forums for women to discuss their concerns, needs and ideas.