Urbanisation, land market and livelihood among farming households in peri-urban Ibadan, Oyo State, Southwest Nigeria

Abstract

This study examined the relationship between urbanization, land market participation and livelihood income of  farming households in peri-urban Ibadan, Oyo state, southwest Nigeria. Multistage sampling procedure was  used in selecting 202 respondents. Primary data were obtained from farming households through the use of  structured questionnaire. Descriptive statistics, Principal Component Analysis, Land Market Index (LMI), Tobit  regression model and multiple Regression model at p-0.05 were used in data analysis. The average urbanicity  index was 0.48 showing that the area was truly peri-urban with 36.1% of the households highly urbanized and  26.7% semi-urbanized. Majority (72.8%) of the respondents were males with 45.6% in the high urban category  and 70.9% of the females in low urban category. Majority (86.6%) were married, with 39.6% in the high urban
category, while 80% of the widowed respondents were in the low urban category. The mean household size was  7(±3.34) persons. Majority (75.7%) had formal education with 69.4% of those without formal education in the  low urban category. While all respondents were involved in crop farming, some combined it with livestock  farming (3.5%), marketing (1.0%), petty goods trading (3.0%) and artisanship (5.9%). The mean livelihood  income was ?32,602.72 (±?30,888.81). An average LMI of 0.41 indicates that 41% of the total land holdings  were acquired through land market. Nativity status (-0.567), total land size (0.391), and urbanicity index (-0.549) had significant effects on households’ participation in land market. Also, participation in non-farm
activities (0.070), livestock farming (0.191), total land size (0.106) and LMI (-0.092) had significant effects on  households’ livelihood income. The extent of land market participation influenced livelihood income negatively showing the implicit effect of urbanization such that households now see other non-land based livelihood activities as more economically rewarding. Also, a positive coefficient means with time, urbanization can be a variable significantly affecting livelihood income, though not presently significant on household livelihood income, is definitely one to look out for. Policy effort aimed at making native and non-native farmers to acquire land with ease will be a potent tool in increasing farm size, which in turn should help increase households’
livelihood income.