ABSTRACT
Credit in agriculture is one of the several vehicles used to finance agricultural transactions. Agricultural credit is a major component of the economy especially in countries where agricultural products can be exported. Lack of information has been identified as a problem militating against receiving credits either by individuals or collective bodies. This study aims to assess the use of credit information sources and services by farmer organizations in Benin city, Edo state, Nigeria. The specific objectives are: to examine the profiles of farmer’s organizations in Benin City; to determine farmers organizations awareness of available information on credit for farmers; to ascertain the sources of agricultural information to farmers organizations; to determine the frequency of farmer organizations use of sources of information; and to examine the challenges encountered by farmer organizations in accessing agricultural credit information.
The scope of this study is limited to registered farmer organizations in Benin City, Edo State. The study is also concerned with only issues related to their use of credit information sources. The study used a mixed method research design and so incorporated both quantitative and qualitative techniques. This was important so as to capture more information concerning their use of credit. The quantitative aspect was used to make judgement on the observable facts in their use of credit information such as their awareness of credit from government and non-government sources. Also to identify where they get this information from. It also highlighted the challenges they face. The quantitative makes use of statistical methods and measures to make meaning of the facts observed from the data. The qualitative method was used to get shared meanings from the respondents in order to understand the issue of credit from their point of view. To select the sample, purposive sampling technique was used in the selection of respondents. Primary data was used for this study.
The most frequently used sources of information are extension agents, newspapers, other farmer organizations, social media and agricultural events. These are used by all the eight farmer organizations. The least used source of information is the use of emails (used by only catfish farmers association), workshops (used by only cocoa association), community meetings (used by cocoa association and catfish farmers association) and letters (used by cocoa farmers association, national coconut producers, processors, and marketers association, national palm producer association of Nigeria and catfish farmers association). While cocoa makes use of all information sources including emails. Rice association do not use fellow farmers to get information on credit and they do not use letters, community meetings, workshops and emails., the Cocoa farmers association face seven out of the 13 challenges. Followed by the Rice farmers association with six of the challenges and then the catfish farmers association with 4 of the challenges. The national palm producer, association faced the least of the challenges which is only two; limited resources to organize training for members and complicated application process. The recommendations are; To enable farmer organizations get credit on time credit information should be made readily available and accessible to them, Information on credit peculiar to a targeted association should get/ be addressed to the association immediately, Televisions, radios and extension agents which are considered more reliable should be used more often to pass information, Other channels of information should be improved upon by allowing only reliable information to be passed across, and these channels should be easily accessible, Complicated application process should be made easier and simple to encourage farmers participation, Extension agents, government officials and bankers should work together to educate farmers more on credit and credit options available to them their by improving the financial literacy of the farmers
