ABSTRACT
This study had the objective of
assessing the role of gender in cooperative development, analyzing the
socio-economic profile of the cooperators on the basis of gender, assessing
gender contributions to cooperative development in terms of membership, organizational
and leadership structures, examining technical efficiency and factors hindering
the implementation of gender sensitive program and activities in Awka North
Local Government Area of Anambra State. A field survey was conducted to collect
data from one hundred and fifty (150) respondents. The study employed
descriptive statistics, stochastic cobb Douglas frontier function as well as
ranking method in the analysis of data collected. The result of the study
indicates that female cooperators, who are within the active age, are
reasonably literate and dominate
the leadership role in cooperatives. The result also shows that farm size and fertilizer use lead to increase
in technical or productive efficiency
among cooperators. The major constraint is gender imbalance or inequality,
conflicting interests, low level of participation, wrong timing of
meetings, and long distance
to meeting venue.
The estimation of technical
efficiency of the cooperators was estimated using cobb-Douglas
functional form of stochastic c frontier model. The coefficients of farm size
and fertilizer possess a positive sign, while gender possessed a negative
coefficient and highly significant, although it does not confirm with a priori
expectation, it shows that female cooperators contribute more to technical or
productive efficiency of their enterprises than their male counterparts.
Hypothesis was tested using chi-sqared X2. This paper recommends
that cooperatives should address equality issues and make a firm commitment in
their mandate to correct imbalances where they exist and to attain equitable
and sustainable development with both men and women in decision- making and
leadership position.
CHAPTER ONE
1.0
INTRODUCTION:
1.1 BACKGROUND
OF THE STUDY:
Gender refers to the socially
constructed roles, behaviours, activities, and attributes that a given society
considers appropriate for men and women.
Gender concept simply refers to
the socially-determined and culturally-specific differences between women and
men as opposed to the biologically determined differences.
Oxford advanced learner’s
dictionary 6th edition sees gender as the fact of being male or
female; gender specific or issue is connected with women only or with men only.
Reeves and baden (2000)sees
gender as the “socially determined ideas and practices of what it is to be
female or male; these ideas and practices are sanctioned and reinforced by a
host of cultural, political and economic institutions including household,
legal and governance structure, markets and religion.
Russo et al (2004) see gender
as socio-economic variables which aid the analysis of roles, responsibilities,
constraints and opportunities of both men and women.
Gender which
is commonly used interchangeably with ‘sex’ within the academic fields of
cultural studies, gender studies and the social sciences in general; often
refers to purely social rather than biological differences, this means that
‘gender roles’ are formed through socialization. Meanwhile, the concept gender,
is an important analytical tool in the planning, management, monitoring and
evaluation of development programs or cooperative projects as requires that
women are considered in relation to men in a socio –cultural setting and not as
an isolated group.
Gender roles focuses on
household and community roles because gender roles are different in any
society, this is because in each society, there are functions of what women and
men of that society are expected to do in their adult life. Since gender roles
are formed through socialization, children are socialized to internalize these
roles; girls and boys are prepared for their different but specific roles.
Gender roles can be defined as the roles that are played by both women and men
which are not determined by biological factors, but by the socio-economic and
cultural environment or situation. Men and women are also characterized by
different roles which mean that men take the lead in productive activities, and
women in reproductive activities, where the latter include the reproduction of
the family and even of society itself. Obviously, women and men’s roles and
responsibilities are separate but they complement one another.
UNDP (1995)
Opined that ‘gender’ is an economic issue as well as a social issue, in fact
more so in Africa than in any other Region and that both men and women play
substantial economic roles, notably in Agriculture and in the informal sector,
but they are not evenly distributed across the sectors of the economy.
Word
Bank (2000)on economic roles of men and women in Africa asked, if Africa can claim the 21st
century?, a study made the argument that Africa has enormous unexploited
potentials. It has hidden growth reserves in its people, including the
potential of its women, who now provide more than half the Region’s labour but
lack equal access to education and factors of production. The study concludes
that gender equality can be a potent force for accelerated poverty reduction in
Africa and Nigeria in particular.
Although ‘gender’ and ‘women’
are often used interchangeably, they are not one in the same .However, most
gender analyses usually find that women are disproportionately disadvantaged,
that is why the majority of gendered interventions target women. As a result of
this, the discussions on gender roles at household and community level revealed
that women do all the reproductive work as well as most of the productive work.
Women have a bigger share of community roles. Women are continuously taking up
roles that were traditionally considered men’s; for example in building.
Finally both men and women agreed that some
men are not taking sufficient responsibility in the homes and that this is one
of the reasons why women take up such responsibilities in view of the well
being of their families; that is ,if a man does not care about building or
repairing the family house, the woman has to do so because she cannot continue
living under a leaking house which is unsafe for the family. This entails that
most of the economic activities are in the hands of women; also, women’s
activities are often constrained to household and community management
activities like child care, food preparation, subsistent agriculture e.t.c.
This is why Moser(1993)refers to women as assuming a triple role, that is ,they
are responsible for reproductive, productive and community management
activities, and receive little recognition for their unpaid work. Therefore,
women, the poor, religious or ethnic minorities may face significant
constraints in their attempt to participate in collective action. Women’s
exclusion from participation may be a direct result of gender norms, or can
emerge from other factors that are determined by such norms. In a study of
mixed-sex agricultural cooperatives in Nicaragua,mayoux found women’s
participation limited to involvement as day labourers; when women attempt to
make their voices heard or gain management positions, they were perceived by
others(men and women)as attempting to step out of their appropriate social
role.
Agarwal et
al(2001)says that ‘gender roles’ vary among cultures and overtime, and crosscut
by a multitude of identities like ethnicity and class, the gender division of
labor usually find men and women relegated to the public and private spheres.
Gender roles at household and
community level have contributed immensely towards genuine equality of men and
women, boys and girls in the economic development. The goals of the youth
development services is to develop the youth to their fullest which is being
creative ,innovative, smart creating hope, opportunity results and dynamic.
This is because from Regulation C/Reg14/13/2003 there is a bill passed that
there should be an establishment unit for gender child and youth socialization,
this is because when we are talking of children and youth, we need to consider
their different languages, culture and socialization in the economy. Moreso,
irrespective of gender, all children and young people are regarded as youth,
and the youth constitute the largest segment in community and agricultural
development.
According to ICA (1995) second
principle ,which says “principle of democratic member control”; this entails
that cooperatives are democratic organizations controlled by their members who
actively participate in setting their policies and making decisions. Men and
Women serving as elected representatives are accountable to the membership. In
primary cooperatives, members have equal voting
rights (one member, one vote) and cooperatives at other levels are also
organized in a democratic manner.
In Anambra state of Nigeria,
agriculture is the major occupation of the people and economic activities
center largely on food production, processing, marketing and distributive
trade. Agricultural producer cooperatives are the main type of societies found
in the state; they are registered as farmers multipurpose cooperative
societies; women who are more in population are the most active in some primary
societies than the men.
Ijere (1991)opined that in
agriculture ,women participate in food production, processing, and distribution
;and in the societies, women are cleaners of rural roads, the regular visitors
to the markets, the impartial arbitrators in family or clan dispute or disagreements,
the preservers of age long customs of yam festivals, child birth, marriage
feast and water collection.
Wiley (1999) Opined that
producers cooperatives can experience on increase in technical efficiency
following a tightening of financial constraints, therefore increasing financial
pressure can affect positively the cooperative efficiency.
Idiong (2007). The productivity
of farmers can be raised either by adoption of improved production technologies
or improvement in efficiency or both.
Gender imbalance in employment,
in job status, in poverty status, and in earnings over time is one the major
problems affecting the development cooperative industries (Nicita and Razzaz
2002).
Gender inequality in access to
and control of a wide range of economic, human, and social capital assets and
resources remains pervasive in Nigeria, and is a core dimension of poverty in
this region. Understanding the nature of these disparities, and acting
forcefully to remove them, is one of the key task of country poverty reduction
strategies(PRS),these strategies could be successful by technical efficiency of
the cooperatives in reducing poverty and supporting the achievement of the
Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) which targets to promote gender equality,
this was adopted by the united nations millennium development goal in September
(2000).So, gender inequality directly or indirectly limits economic growth in
Anambra state and imposes substantial development costs. world bank(2000).
Another problem that need to be
addressed is the unequal relations of power between men and women on the socio
–economic level; this results in the unequal
distribution of the benefits of development and hinders women participation in
the development process (ICA-ILO Gender Package).
Gender disparity in leadership,
education, management and employment seems to lower the economic growth of our
societies. Although cooperative organizations and governments have policies of
equity and equal opportunity, cooperative societies will ensure that women are
afforded equal treatment in regard to employment opportunities, promotion, and
wages etc., democratic participation in cooperatives mean that both men, women,
and youths should participate equally in cooperatives and that both men’s and
women’s needs and concerns must be addressed equally.
Technical inefficiency
(productive inefficiency) is due to inadequate working capital for the
cooperators, lack of education, poor management, and low level of participation
among members mainly the male cooperators, lack of extension education and
service, wrong timing of meetings, conflicting interest, gender inequality, and
long distance to meeting venues .
Obviously, women all over the
world especially in Nigeria form a significant percentage of the world today
and despite their contribution to the national economy, cooperatives and rural
development, they are often been neglected. Meaning that women occupy a central
position in economic production especially in
agriculture and in the informal sector but they are not equally distributed
across the productive sectors, that is women are being marginalized in
mainstream activities(Elson and Evers 1997).
1.3
STATEMENT OF RESEARCH QUESTION
*
What are the socio economic profiles
of the cooperator on the bi of gender?
*
What are the contribution of gender
to the cooperative development in term of membership, organization and
leadership structure?
*
What is the technical efficiency of
the cooperator ho I the technical efficiency of the cooperator been compared
long gender line.
* What
are the factors hindering the implication of gender sensitive programme and
activities in the societies.
1.4
OBJECTIVE OF THE STUDY:
The broad objective of this
study is to assess the roles played by gender in cooperative development in
Anambra state of Nigeria. The specific objectives include to:
-
Analyze the socio-economic profile
of the cooperators on the basis of gender.
-
Assess gender contributions to cooperative
development in terms of membership, organizational and leadership structures.
-
Compare the technical efficiency of
the cooperators along gender lines.
-
Examine factors hindering the implementation
of gender sensitive programmes and activities in the societies.
-
Make recommendations based on the
findings.
1.5
STATEMENT OF HYPOTHESES
H1 Cooperators activities are male dominated.
H2 technical
efficiency is positively related to education, farming experience, farm size,
extension visit, credit access, household size, gender; and negatively related
to age.
H3
male cooperators are more efficient than the female cooperators.
1.6
JUSTIFICATION OF THE STUDY
The justification of this study
can be perceived that both men and omen ply substantial economic role, notably
in agriculture and in the inform lector, but they are not evenly distributed
cross the sector of the economy UNDP (1995). The government of Nigeria will
benefit from the findings of this research because it shows
and identifies the problems of unequal relations of power between men and women
on the socio-economic level and make suggestions for improvement.
It
will provide adequate and useful information to the members of cooperatives and
to the general public on the concept of gender.
It
will be useful to other researchers and readers.
1.7
LIMITATION AND SCOPE OF THE STUDY
Due
to time factor which is caused by the shortness of period in which this
research conducted, financial constraint which hinder the researcher movement
to all the cooperative societies in Awka north to get first hand information
has nearly frustrated the researcher effort.
This research work is limited
to Awka North L.G. A in the assessment of the role of gender in cooperative
development in Anambra state, Nigeria has up to 200 viable and unviable
cooperative of which 150 were selected the sample size.
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