Assessment of the role of gender in cooperative development

Thesis 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.

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