ABSTRACT

This study determined gender factors in access and use of improved yam technologies. Yam production has not met with demands and the development efforts being made for increased yam production have not yielded the desired results. The crop was traditionally regarded as a 'male' crop it therefore became necessary to evaluate the problems of access and use of improved yam technologies from gender perspective. The study location was the South-eastern Agricultural zone of Nigeria which comprised of Abia, Anambra, Ebonyi, Enugu and Imo Sates. This area was chosen because it had shown elasticity of demand for yam year round. Data for the study were collected using structured questionnaire and interview schedule. The respondents were made up of 113 female and 121 male farmers randomly selected from 3 agricultural sub-zones of each of the 5 states. Data collected were analyzed through the determination of percentages, mean, graphs and multiple regression analyses. The result indicated that most of the respondents were resource poor, small scale subsistence farmers who had limited access to resources necessary for the use of improved yam technologies. However, the result showed the male respondents had access to most of the available resources more that their female counterparts. The result also revealed a high level of women's participation in yam farming. This disputed the belief that yam was a 'male' crop but reasoned that this belief would have been based on the fact that the men performed the yam sacrifices and took most of the yam titles. The result further indicated that the rate of use of the improved yam technologies evaluated was about 30% and 23% for the male and female respondents respectively. In the use of the improved yam technologies, women excelled more than men in those intricate components of the technologies. Also, both men and women indicated that their greatest problem in the use of improved yam technologies was its high level of labour requirement. The result of multiple regression analysis showed the various factors evaluated for influenced male and female respondents differently. Whereas education, income, extension contact and market had significant positive influence on the use of improved yam technologies of male respondents, extension contact, market, land ownership and transport had significant positive influence on the female respondents. The multiple regression analysis also indicated that credit, planting materials and transport had significant negative influence on the use of improved yam technologies of male respondents while membership of cooperatives, planting materials, use of fertilizers and farm size had significant negative influence on the use of improved yam technologies of the female respondents. Measures therefore should be taken to improve access of farmers generally and women farmers in particular to resources necessary of the use of improved yam technologies. The fabrication of machinery to reduce labour cost and make for commercial production of yam should be encouraged. Also, there is need to reorganize extension services in such a way that clients will be made to pay for services rendered. This will make extension services demanddriven and more appropriate to the needs of farmers.