ABSTRACT

The Study Analyzed Factors Affecting Fertilizer Use Intensity Among Arable Crop Farmers In Ikwuano Local Government Area Of Abia State, Nigeria. Primary data obtained from 10 arable crop farmers were randomly sampled from the 8 villages making it a total of 80 arable crop farmers. Descriptive statistics and Multivariate Linear Regression Analysis were used to analyze data collected. The result shows that the fertilizer use in the study area was moderately high due to enormous demand on the limited land in the study area to most sign many farmers to fertilizer use intensity. Age, Gender, Educational Level, Household Size, Price of Fertilizer are significant factors affecting fertilizer use intensity among arable crop farmers. The study recommends that the government and other policy makers should invest for increased knowledge and skills of farmers through avenues such as field days, extension agents contact with farmers or any other capacity building. Rural credit should be emphasized in order to mobilize savings and maximize the availability of credit to the farmers and to facilitate the distribution and uses of fertilizers, the agro-services centers as sources of fertilizer, supply should be reinstated and more agro-services centers should be opened in the rural areas. Besides, mechanism should be put in place to ensure that the subsidized fertilizer reaches the famers at the subsidized price. Fertilizer record at state and local government levels over the few years should be scrutinized to ensure and unstill a sense of accountability and determine the true fertilizer situation at these levels.