PROFITABILITYOF SHEEP MARKETING IN BAUCHI LOCAL GOVERNMENT AREA OF BAUCHI STATE, NIGERIA.

Abstract

The study examined the profitability of sheep marketing in Bauchi Local Government Area, Bauchi state, in Nigeria. Purposive and simple random sampling techniques were used to select 60 sheep marketers from the study area. Data were collected using structured questionnaire and analyzed using descriptive statistics, farm budgeting and multiple regression analysis. The result showed that sheep marketers had mean household size of 13 persons. Majority (83%) of respondents invested from their personal savings while only 5% collected loan. The result further revealed that 13.30% of the respondents invested less than ₦50,000 to start the sheep marketing while 29.20% invested above ₦300.000 and half (50%) of the respondents revealed open market as their major source of information. In addition, the marketing margin, net income and returns per naira invested per sheep in the study area was ₦38,816.40, ₦33,926.70, and ₦0.26 respectively. The findings revealed that the cost of sheep, feeding, and medication were significant at (p <0.001), (P <0.01) and (p < 0.05), respectively. In addition, the estimated value of R² was 0.784 for sheep marketing, implying that the included variables explained 78% variation in the total revenue of the sheep marketing. The study concluded that sheep marketing was profitable. Finally, the study identified inadequate credit facilities, inadequate market information, high cost of transportation and inadequate housing facilities as the most pressing constraints affecting the system. The study therefore, recommends the need for credit or financial support to improve marketing activities and improvement of banking service. Government should provide good means of transporting the animal like the possibility of using trains, construct good feeder roads so as to reduce rate of taxes/levy in transit and high marketing charges.