ABSTRACT

The study examined the effect of agricultural commercialization on production, consumption and nutrition in farm households in Abia State. The study was conducted in 120 households spread across the three agricultural zones of the state. Multi stage random sampling was adopted in selecting respondent households. Data collection was undertaken between May and December 2004. Panel data were collected fortnightly from respondents through personal interviews with the aid of well —structured questionnaires. Anthropometrics measurements of 169 children between the ages of 6 months and 72 months were taken using bathroom scales and height meter. Data analysis involved the use of descriptive statistics and multivariate econometric estimation techniques. Agriculture in the study is not subsistence-oriented. On average, 43.9 percent of agricultural production is for home consumption, thus aggregate marketed surplus is 56.1 percent. Majority of farm household earn off-farm income on average of 54.2 percent of total income. Households are not subsistence oriented in consumption as own produced food consumed accounts for only 28.5 percent of total consumption value. The ordinary least square estimates shows that labour, fertilizer and planting materials were positive and significant determinants of agricultural commercialization. The result further shows the production elasticity of labour to be high 0.73. Labour productivity showed differences across household tercile groups. A multivariate analysis was employed to capture differences in labour productivity. Farm size, management and fertilizer came out as the variables significantly explaining variability in labour productivity. Off-farm work is influenced by labour productivity in agriculture. To explicitly account for off-farm income an econometric estimation was undertaken The result reveals that off-farm income is accounted for by off-farm wage rate, share of women in household, education of household head and adult persons in households. Attempt was made to determine factors that account for subsistence orientation in consumption. The estimation result shows that Person- land ratio, wage income and age of household had impacts on subsistence orientation. A further analysis shows that income as proxied by expenditure per capita, household size and the share of children in households accounted more for household food expenditure. Children in the least-subsistence households were growth retarded and the highest prevalence of malnutrition was recorded in the most subsistence households. An income-based model was adopted to assess the effect of household demographics on z — scores values. The major finding of the analysis shows that the income effect of incremental income on nutritional status of childron is decreasing at the margin. More importantly, in all cases, there was no observed negative effect of commercialization on children's nutritional status. The study observes andsuggests community health services have to move in tandem with agricultural development process, an increased income and wealth of communities may provide the resources required at the community — level to sustain local health services.