ABSTRACT

 The study assessed the effectiveness of Fadama HI Agricultural Project in empowering the participants in Bayelsa State. Objectives that guided the study were the participant’s socioeconomic characteristics, their level of participation, the activities made available for participation, effectiveness ofthe Project, the benefits derived by the participants, factors that influenced participation and factors that influenced effectiveness, problems encountered by the participants. Simple random sampling technique was used to select 150 farmers that participated, and 150 staff from the delivery agency. Data were collected with a structured questionnaire. The data collected were analyzed using descriptive statistics such as frequency count, percentage, mean (X) and standard deviation (STD), while inferential statistics such as z-test and multiple regression analysis was used to test the null hypotheses at 0.05% level of significance. The finding showed that farmers were averagely 42.6 years old, 54.7% of the farmers were females while 45.4% were males, 72.1% of the farmers were married. The farmers farm averagely 0.9 hectares and had averagely 7 persons per household. The farmers were literate, experienced in farming with mean monthly estimated income from Fadama of N44, 133.83. Extension visit to farmers was low with 38.7 percent being the largest proportion of the entire sampled farmers. Farmers participated actively in training of all the activities such as micro-credit services, timely input supply advisory service, extensive yam production, extensive plantain production, extensive cassava production, mixed cropping, advisory services on marketing produce, advisory services on production technologies. National Fadama III Project was not effective in the conduct ofmost of her project activities in Bayelsa State. Farmers did not benefit commendably from Fadama ID Project. Food insecurity, low level of income and high level of poverty mostly influence their level of participation in the study area. Availability of funds for loan services, availability of operational logistics, monitoring of Project activities, relationship with project communities and types of enterprise farmers participate influenced the effectiveness of Fadama HI project delivery agency in empowering the participants in Bayelsa state. No access to Fadama project personnel’s when the need arise, lack of fund, non-regular training, poor communication channel and delays in being attended to by the delivery agency were the top constraints faced by farmers in National Fadama DI Project. Hypotheses 1 showed that farmers do not receive training in all the various activities under National Fadama HI Agricultural Project in Bayelsa State, while the result of hypotheses 2 showed that farmers were not effectively empowered through Fadama IH Project in all the various activities under National Fadama HI Agricultural Project in Bayelsa State. The study therefore recommended that National Fadama HI Project should be properly funded and its activities should be reorganized to be ofgreat benefit to the farmers, proper training in all the activities should be made available for effective participation, empower the participants to improve their income level, and to move them away from poverty by improving their standard ofliving by reorganizing the Fadama DI Project.