Influence of selected factors on youth participation in agriculture in Kajiado North Sub-County, Kenya

About 60% of the Kenyan population is comprised of youth. Agriculture provides over 80% of employment opportunities and livelihood to Kenyans. However, while youth unemployment is rising, youth engagement in agriculture is declining. Kenya‟s service and industrial sectors have not created enough jobs for the youthful labour force. Declining youth engagement in agriculture has implications on household and national food and nutritional security, unemployment and underemployment which may undermine the Government‟s efforts to ensure the 10% national economic growth through agriculture as envisioned in the country‟s Vision 2030. This study investigated the influence of selected factors on youth participation in agriculture in Kajiado North Sub-County focusing on youth 18-35 years old. The study used a Cross-Sectional Survey Design and was guided by five research objectives. Stratified random sampling was used to obtain a sample size of 397 respondents consisting of 192 male and 205 female youth. A census was used for agricultural and youth officers. The Sub-County was purposively sampled because of its potential for agricultural productivity and for having the highest number of educated unemployed youth compared to other Sub-Counties in the County. Data were collected using two questionnaires, one for youth and the other for agriculture and youth officers. The instrument‟s content validity was ascertained by a panel of five experts from the Department of Agricultural Education and Extension. A pilot test was conducted in Kajiado East Sub-County to determine the instrument‟s reliability coefficient, which was 0.86α and 0.80α for youth and for officers respectively. Both reliability coefficients were above the 0.70 threshold for acceptable reliability in educational research. Qualitative data was classified into common themes to identify the emerging trends and was analyzed by Pearson Product Moment Correlation Coefficient (PPMCC). Frequency tables and percentages were used to summarize the data. The results showed a statistically significant positive relationship between the selected factors: youth access to land (r=0.345, p=0.01), finances (r=0.197, p=0.01) and markets (r=0.330, p=0.01) and youth perception of agriculture (r=0.675 p=0.01) all of which influenced their participation in agriculture. The policy-makers, development practitioners and other actors in the Sub-County and in Kenya as a whole should develop a coherent and integrated initiative to address core challenges facing the youth when entering the agriculture sector. The initiative should improve youth perception of agriculture and increase their access to the agriculture sector, offers great opportunities for agricultural productivity as well as food and nutritional security and sustainability.