FACTORS AFFECTING WOMEN FARMERS PARTICIPATION IN AGRICULTURAL EXTENSION ACTIVITIES IN KADUNA STATE, NIGERIA

The study examined the factors affecting women farmers" participation in agricultural extension activities in Kaduna State, Nigeria. Purposive sampling was used to select Lere local government area, where 5 villages were purposively selected: Saminaka, Lere, Ungwa-Bawa, Yarkasuwa and Kayarda. Data were gathered through the administration of questionnaire to 25% randomly selected farmers from each of the 5 villages. Descriptive statistics such as frequency counts and percentage were used to describe the data while linear regression was used to examine the factors that affect participation in agricultural extension activities by women farmers. The result shows that the average age of the women is 40 years. Also, majority (71%) of the women were married, educated (33%), with 1 -5 household members (67%) and most (67%) of whom were non -members of cooperative. Furthermore, crop activities rank 1 st in the list of extension activities and most (57%) had extension contact on quarterly basis. The level of participation showed that about half (48%) of the women farmers highly participate in extension activities. The regression result shows that extension contact is the only significant factor that influences participation in agricultural extension activities in the study area. The involvement of women farmers in cooperative societies and regularity of extension visit was recommended.