Government Spending on Poverty Alleviation through Co-operatives: A Case Study of Fadama III Project Crop Farmers’ Co-operative Societies in IMO State (Nigeria)

This work evaluates government spending on poverty alleviation through co-operatives looking at crop farmers’ co-operative societies of the Fadama III Project in Imo State of Nigeria. The study estimated annual incomes and productive resources used by the farmers before and after joining the project and identified constraints to the realization of project objectives. Descriptive statistics such as frequency counts, means and percentages, as well as multiple regression model using the ordinary least squares (OLS) approach were used to analyze data obtained. Hypotheses were tested using t-statistic in Two-Sample T-test. Chow-statistic was used to test for differences in the coefficients of the regression variables. Findings indicated that the farmers realized Mean incomes and productive resources of N214,281.68 and N464,425.21; and N86,568.19 and N281,631.62 were respectively estimated for farmers before and after joining the project. There were significant differences between incomes and productive resources of the farmers before and after joining the project implying goodness of the policy. The crop farmers’ annual incomes before and after joining the project were significantly determined by distance to the market, farm size, extension visits and value of productive resources. Irregular fund disbursement topped the list of nine constraints to effective realization of project objectives arranged in descending order of seriousness. Early and prompt release of productive resources and cash counterpart contributions to the farmers, provision of more extension agents, services and logistics for the farmers and reduction of users’ cash contribution will ensure improved productivity, income and project sustainability.