Assessment of Gender Involvement in Sheep and Goat Production in Ejigbo Local Government Area (LGA), Osun State, Nigeria

Abstract

Sheep and goat production has become an important livelihood source for many rural households in southwestern Nigeria. The study compared the extent of involvement of male and female farmers in goat and sheep production, identified constraints and examined the influence of socio-economic characteristics of male and female farmers on their involvement in goat and
sheep production. The study utilised a two-stage sampling procedure to select 25 sheep and goat farmers each in the six purposively selected villages to make a total of 150 respondents for interview using a structured interview schedule. Descriptive analysis such as mean, graphical illustration, frequency and percentages and inferential statistics (Independent Two Sample t-test and Poisson regression) were used to analyse the data. The overall mean involvement score was 7.67 while the mean involvement scores for males and females were 4.7 and 9.0 respectively, indicating a significantly higher involvement by the female gender (t= -3.7, p<0.001) than males.
Both male and female farmers identified pests and diseases, inadequate capital, erratic changes in weather as the most important constraints to sheep and goat production. However, more males (93.6%) than females (88.7%) ranked pest and diseases as the most important constraint. Socioeconomic variables that were significantly associated with involvement in goat and sheep farming among the male and female gender include the age of respondents, education and household size. The study concludes that identifying the key constraints to goat and sheep farming is an important step in improving goat and sheep production and enhancing rural livelihoods in the community