Rural Urban Migration And Its Effect On Agricultural Production In Ikwuano Local Government Area, Abia State, Nigeria

ABSTRACT

The broad objective of this study was on rural-urban migration and its effect on agricultural production in Ikwuano local government area of Abia State, Nigeria. Primary data were used for the study. Primary data were collected for the study using a questionnaire from the random sample of 80 farmers selected from eight communities randomly selected from the four clans that made up the Local Government Area. Descriptive statistics and regression analysis were used for data analysis. The result showed that the farmers in Ikwuano were old and men engage more in farming at their older ages than their female counterpart. The farmers were married, literate individuals with relatively high household size. The farmers operate in small scale and had several years of farming experience. Labour supply in the area depended on family labour due to the high cost of hiring labour. The farmer's annual income and amount invested in farming are grossly low. Level of rural-urban migration in the study area is high. The mean number of migration was approximately 4 persons per household in the study area. Educational status, household size, age, marital status and employment status of the migrants influenced the level of rural-urban migration in the study area while age, sex, farm size, labour, level of migration, and farming experience influenced their output level. Unemployment, inadequate basic social amenities, poor economic empowerment; poor quality of education, poor standard of living and insecurity of life and properties caused rural-urban migration in the study area. The study recommend that government should give cash incentives to the people of the area especially to the youths after every farming season based on their level of output as this will motivated more of the able-bodied youths to detest urban migration but concentrate on farming to better their standard of living.