Abstract
In the past two decades, population-environment research has focused on the hypothesis that house hold population has significant influence on agricultural land-use patterns and the health of the environment. This study is therefore aimed at providing land use planners in Nigeria with basic data and information that will be useful in identifying the prospects for and constraints to intensive cultivation systems in Obagaji area. The simple random sampling technique, using the table of random digits and availability sampling method were respectively employed to select settlements and farmers for investigations. Structured interview was utilized to generate data for the study. In order to capture the inputs to land in the study area, the level of agricultural land-use intensity was measured, using three surrogates, namely, proportion of farmland cultivated, frequency of cultivation and crop combination level. The study results showed that Obagaji area is a mixed cropping region where semi permanent cultivation with rotational bush fallow system dominates the existing cultivation systems. The characteristic features of agricultural practices in households with low number of family members in the area are: more extensive land-use systems, more of shifting elements than permanent cultivation, only very small proportion of land is under cultivation at any one time and very short cropping period on the field. The reverse is true for households with high number of family members. The direct variation in intensity of agricultural land use with regards to family size in the area is significant. Key words: Obagaji area, agricultural land, family size, farm labour.
Highlights
Human population and natural environment research in the past two decades has focused on household level population dynamics and their relationships, through livelihood strategies, to environmental change, in the rural areas of developing countries
The focus has been on the relationship between farm labour and agriculture production as well as farm labour and agricultural land use pattern in relation to individual farm family rather than the absolute regional or national population density
Their opinion is premised on Boserup (1965)’s hypothesis that population growth leads to an increase in agricultural intensification; and rooted in Malthus assumption that increase in population could facilitate a greater competition for land resources that could lead to diminishing return or outright resource shortage
Summary
Human population and natural environment research in the past two decades has focused on household level population dynamics and their relationships, through livelihood strategies, to environmental change, in the rural areas of developing countries. The focus has been on the relationship between farm labour and agriculture production as well as farm labour and agricultural land use pattern in relation to individual farm family rather than the absolute regional or national population density. Their opinion is premised on Boserup (1965)’s hypothesis that population growth leads to an increase in agricultural intensification; and rooted in Malthus assumption that increase in population could facilitate a greater competition for land resources that could lead to diminishing return (declining marginal or unit output) or outright resource shortage. There are no such scientific studies based on agricultural landuse systems in Obagaji area This has constricted the understanding of agricultural land-use pattern, in particular, with regards to household size in the study area. The specific objective is to evaluate the strength of the relationship between household size and cropping systems and practices in the area
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