Evaluation Of Farmers Participation In Oilseeds Value Addition And Implication On Their Income: A Case Of Sunflower In Kilosa

ABSTRACT

This study aimed at evaluating farmers participation in the value addition to oilseeds

and its implication on farmer’s income with special emphasis on sunflower. The

general objective was to promote sustainable sunflower production and income

generation through value addition in the rural sunflower potential areas of Tanzania.

Specifically the study aimed to: assess processing capacity and utilization, identify

factors influencing farmer participation in value addition, describe marketing

channels of farmer value added sunflower in the market area of Tanzania, describe

oil millers constraints and suggest interventions. Structured questionnaires were used

to collect primary data from purposefully selected 205 respondents; 100 participating

and 100 non participating farmers, and 5 oil millers from 8 villages. Discussions and

participatory observations methods were also used. The results indicate that milling

capacity is about 11,280kgs per day of which only about 32.3% is utilized at peak

period and about 14.3% when sunflower is scarce. Most of farmers sold their

sunflower products in the village. Millers were constrained by breakdown of

machine, power cuts and scarcity of sunflower. The logit model was estimated using

data from 200 farmers to test the hypothesis that socio-economic and institutional

factors influence farmer participation in value addition to sunflower. Education and

price had significant positive influences. Inadequate knowledge, formal knowledge,

low income and poor market information had significant negative influences. There

is a need to foster farmer’s involvement in the process of imparting knowledge.

Reliable market information system countrywide which; can effectively connect

producers and buyers, electricity and rural road network need to be in place.