RESOURCE UTILIZATION EFFECTS OF FADAMA III UNDER RAINY SEASON AND DRY SEASON WATER MELON (Citrullus lanatus) PRODUCTION IN GOMBE STATE, NIGERIA

Abstract

The study was conducted in Gombe State, Nigeria to examine the impact of Fadama III project on resource utilization under rainy season and dry season water melon production. A combination of stratified and simple random sampling was used to draw up the 308 respondents. Both descriptive and inferential statistics (difference-in-difference and efficiency ratios) were used to analyze the data. The results reveal that estimated marginal value product(MVP) of land (NGN 20.60), seeds (NGN 29.62), organic chemicals (NGN33.00) and fuel (NGN13.33) were higher than their respective marginal input cost (MIC) for beneficiaries of Fadama III project meaning that their r > 1 (underutilization) because of the limited access to farm resource faced by farmers. For the non-beneficiaries group, the MVP of land (NGN28.28), seeds (NGN26.30), organic chemicals (NGN30.46) and fuel (NGN20.41) were higher than their corresponding MIC implying that a 1% increase in either variable will lead to an increase of the corresponding total value product. It was further disclosed that the average mean total area contribution to output by Fadama III beneficiaries was 41.7 tons/ha valued at NGN10,121.0 per ton compared with the non-beneficiaries water melon farmers in rainy season with average mean total area contribution to output of 27.1tons/ha valued at NGN1,733.0 per ton. In dry season, it was 100.7 tons/ha valued at NGN 1,812.0 per ton for beneficiaries compared with total area contribution to output of 70.8tons/ha valued at NGN425.0 per ton for non-beneficiaries. This signifies that the beneficiaries were better off than the non-beneficiaries in both rainy and dry season farming in terms of total plot area cultivation. The findings, even though, shows a moderate substitution existed between family and hired labour, in the study area, family labour was more economical to use by Fadama III beneficiaries rainy season.In terms of non-crop activities, the demand for hired labour was elastic. A 45% increase in value addition was also reported with expected increase in the respondent’s income through reduction of post-harvest losses. The study recommends that farmers in the study area should be allowed to have increased access to farm land through community-driven land certification approach and more processing technologies through community-driven development approach.