Abstract:
Abstract
There have been heated debates on the effectiveness of foreign aid like the FADAMA III
programme on the well-being of the beneficiaries. Most of the studies established a
positive relationship between foreign aid like the FADAMA III project and development
using economic indicators like: Gross Domestic Product (GDP), Gross National Product
(GNP), and per capita income. None of these studies used development indicators like:
food security and poverty among others. This study examines the effects of the FADAMA III
programme on food security in Apa Local Government Area of Benue state. The study
adopted a survey design and purposive sampling procedure to select seven (7) informants
from Apa Local Government Area. Key Informant Interview (KII) was the instrument
used to collect information from the key informants and analyzed non-numerically. The
study found that training constitutes the major activities of the FADAMA III
programme, targeting poverty, unemployment reduction and food security. The study
equally found that most of the beneficiaries are still within the moderate and low
threshold in their condition of living; and therefore concluded that the FADAMA III
programme did not eradicate and reduced to the barest minimum cases of food insecurity
and poverty in Apa Local Government Area of Benue State. The study therefore
recommends broadening of scope of subsequent FADAMA III assistance programmes in
terms of training and coverage to enable it to ameliorate the challenges of food insecurity
in Apa Local Government Area of Benue State, Nigeria.
