Abstract:
The rural women who constitute the bulk of the agricultural population in Kaduna State are
poor and the only alternative for raising capital has continued to elude them. Low
investments in agriculture have been traced largely to banks unwillingness to make credit
available to women farmers who are perceived by banks as high- risk investors. This problem
of inadequate finance has made them to produce at subsistence level. Therefore this study
investigated rural access to credit and also the impact on agricultural output in Kaduna State.
Primary data were collected through the use of structured questionnaire and Focus Group
Discussion (FGD). Two Local Government Areas (LGAs) were selected. They are Jema'a and
kaura Local Government Areas of Kaduna state. The selection was based on women
involvement in agricultural activities. A multi-stage random sampling technique-was applied
in the selection of eighty (80) women farmers. Each Local Government Areas had (40)
respondents. The analytical tools used include among others frequencies, means and
percentages. The chi-square was also used to test the null hypothesis that there was no
significant relationship between amount accessed from formal source and output. It was
discovered that 17% of these rural women sourced credit from formal sources like
commercial banks, agricultural banks) and 83% of them got theirs from informal sources like
■ends, relatives, NGOs and personal saving. Women in the study area generally
countered problems in accessing the two sources of credit. The women in the study area
icountered problem like inaccessibility of credit institution, lack of collateral security,
administrative bureaucracy in accessing formal sources of credit. Therefore, establishment of
banks in the rural areas, minimization of procedure in getting loans and implementing
programmes that will facilitate women access to credit facilities were solutions preferred to
improve women access to credit and increased agricultural output in Nigeria.
