Challenges facing rural dwellers’ participation in community-based agriculture and rural development project in Gombe state

Abstract

Studies have affirmed the effectiveness of community-based development project in helping rural dwellers improve their socio-economic status. However, both internal and external forces do pose challenges to beneficiaries’ participation in any development project. Hence this study focused on the challenges facing rural dwellers’ participation in community-based agriculture and rural development projects in Gombe state, Nigeria. Multistage sampling technique was used to sample 71 respondents from 3 selected Rural Village Areas (RVAs). The results show that 36.6% of the respondents were between age 41 and 50, 31.0% between 31 and 40, and 11.3% below 31years (mean=43.7). Of all the respondents, female were 50.7%, 94.4% married and 78.9% educated. Majority of the respondents (69.0%) were farmers and 67.6% earned below mean income of N14,711.27. Only 3 of the 8 identified challenges had means above overall mean (Mean=1.13). No significant relationship existed between participation and sex (?²=0.014, p < 0.05), age (r= 0.129, p < 0.284). However, significant relationship existed between participation and marital status (?²=55.901, p < 0.05), education (?²=26.070, p < 0.05), source of income (?²=76.324, p < 0.05), household (r= 0.370, p < 0.01) and monthly income (r= 0.129, p < 0.01). There was no significant relationship between challenges faced and participation in community-based agriculture and rural development project activities (r=0.068, p < 0.996). In conclusion, the challenges were not yet serious on participation. However, issues of delayed implementation, unfulfilled promise and finance, with scores above means should be addressed by the development agencies as they can affect participation.