Evaluation of Social Capital Attributes as Predictors of Collective Actions among Smallholder Farmers in Tinderet Sub-County, Kenya

Abstract

Small farms make up 85% of farms worldwide. Similarly, in Kenya, the agriculture sector is dominated by smallholder farmers. To overcome constraints imposed by small units and for sustainable development, smallholders often organise themselves into groups or farmer-producer organisations (FPOs) to access services. They exploit elements of social capital; social networks, norms and trust to enhance cooperation for collective actions. It is often assumed that social capital attributes among farmers’ groups are exploited for positive collective actions such as access to credits and the sale of aggregated produce. Social capital attributes, however, differ from one farmer organisation to another. This study evaluated levels of social capital attributes among farmers from value-chain-linked groups. The predictive value of the social capital indicators on the desired outcome of collective actions was investigated. Based on a retrospective study design, interviews were conducted on 72 farmers drawn from 9 FPOs with 215 members. Attitude scales ranked 1 to 5 were used to gather the opinions of participants on the attributes. Participants were sampled by purposive and multi-stage sampling schemes. Single-sample Wilcoxon test was used to analyse strength of each attribute among participants. Median value for indicators of social trust, social participation, norms, common vision and social networks were significantly higher than ‘neutral,’ P< .05. Collective actions in inputs-acquisition and produce-selling did not differ significantly from ‘neutral’ (P > .05). The mean for social capital attributes had strong predictive ability on collective actions as tested by Spearman’s Rank analysis using SPSS; R2 = .382, P = .000. The collective actions in learning, inputs-purchase, produce-selling, price negotiations and market-information seeking could be predicted from the social capital attributes evaluated. It is recommended that stakeholders build capacity of FPOs, particularly for collective actions in inputs-acquisition and marketing of produce for sustainable development