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† Corresponding author 
© 2015 Conscientia Beam. All Rights Reserved. 

GENDER ISSUES OF LABOUR PARTICIPATION IN VEGETABLE 

PRODUCTION IN IKORODU LOCAL GOVERNMENT AREA OF LAGOS 

STATE 

 

Omowumi A. Olowa1† --- Olatomide W. Olowa2 

1,2Department of Agricultural Education, Federal College of Education (Technical) Akoka, Lagos State, Nigeria 

 

ABSTRACT 

The study was conducted to identify and specify gender tasks and roles in vegetable production with 

ultimate goal of better targeting the resources in agricultural sector. One hundred and twenty vegetable 

farmers were surveyed in Ikorodu local government area of Lagos State. Multistage stage sampling 

technique was used to select one hundred and twenty (120) vegetable farmers as the sample for the study. 

Data was collected by means of structured questionnaire. Percentages, Means and Frequencies were the 

main descriptive statistical tools utilized while Pearsons’ correlation coefficients were estimated to ascertain 

the association between women participation and selected socioeconomic variables. The findings revealed 

that 87.50% of females and 91.07% male vegetable farmers fall between the ages of 20-50 years with a 

mean age of 50.85 years. 65.61% of females and 30.36% of males’ vegetable farmers had formal education 

while none of the vegetable farmers receive post-secondary education. The role of women in majority of the 

cases was supportive in nature while the dominative role in most of the cases was performed by men. 

Correlation analysis revealed that Age, marital status, farming experience and Farm size were positively 

related with women participation in vegetable production. Education had no relationship with women 

participation in vegetable production. It was suggested that projects and programmes that aim to increase 

vegetable production should be designed to address the complementary roles that men and women farmers 

play.  

Keywords: Gender, Vegetable production, Labour, Participation, Lagos State, Ikorodu LGA. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Current Research in Agricultural Sciences 
2015 Vol. 2, No. 4, pp. 114-122 
ISSN(e): 2312-6418 
ISSN(p): 2313-3716 
DOI: 10.18488/journal.68/2015.2.4/68.4.114.122 
© 2015 Conscientia Beam. All Rights Reserved. 

 
 
 
 
 
 

http://crossmark.crossref.org/dialog/?doi=10.18488/journal.68/2015.2.4/68.4.114.122


Current Research in Agricultural Sciences, 2015, 2(4): 114-122 

 

 

115 
© 2015 Conscientia Beam. All Rights Reserved. 

Contribution/ Originality 

This study documents that although women dominated in some operations of vegetable 

cultivation but in totality male participation was more prominent. The roles of women in majority 

of the cases were supportive in nature while the dominative roles in most of the cases were 

performed by men. The study further  revealed  that age, marital status, farm experience and farm 

size were positively related to women participation in vegetable production in the study area 

while education was negatively related to women participation in vegetable production. 

 

1. INTRODUCTION 

The means of livelihood of more than two-third of Nigeria’s population residing in rural 

areas continues to revolve around agriculture and related activities [1]. Although men are 

believed to be the major actors in agricultural activities, yet female active participation in farming 

activities is an important characteristic of Nigeria’s agriculture and therefore, cannot be 

overemphasized [2, 3]. Family farming system is predominantly patriarchal in nature in which 

both males and females contribute their labour input. Males are expected to play dominant role in 

farming because of their access to farm resources, production technologies, output and influence 

on decision making process [4]. Ironically, women are known to be more involved in agricultural 

activities than men in sub-Saharan African (SSA) countries, Nigeria inclusive. According to 

World Bank Statistics, women perform two third of entire world’s work and produce more than 

half of food in most of developing countries. As much as 73 % of women were involved in cash 

crops, arable and vegetable gardening. In some states rural women have virtually taken over the 

production and processing of arable crops being responsible for as much as 80 % of the staple food 

items [5].  

The horticultural crops especially vegetables which are widely cultivated in most parts of 

Nigeria, as a cheap and reliable source of protein, vitamins, zinc and iron which also constitute 

between 30% and 50% of iron and vitamins A sources in poor diet are more laborious than other 

crops and women contribute towards all vegetable production activities. Activities such as 

weeding, fertilizer application, harvesting and cleaning are predominantly female activities. 

However, males are playing leading role in ridge making and irrigating fields [6, 7]. The 

questions are what was the extent of involvement of women in vegetable cultivation when 

compared to their male counter-part?  What were the characteristics of the women?  What were 

the relationship between the selected characteristics of the women and their participation in 

vegetable cultivation? Thus, an attempt has been made in this paper to analyze the demographic 

and other related characteristics of vegetable farmers; to examine the pattern of gender 

participation in different activities involved in vegetable production and the association between 

women participation and various socio-economic variables.  

 

2. LITERATURE REVIEW  

Sultana [8] stated that homestead vegetables and fruits from an integral part of the family 

diet and a part of them enter the commercial market. All through every member of the family has 



Current Research in Agricultural Sciences, 2015, 2(4): 114-122 

 

 

116 
© 2015 Conscientia Beam. All Rights Reserved. 

some contribution the major labor input was contributed by women. Most of the homestead 

agricultural activities, including seed preparation, land preparation; transplanting, watering and 

harvesting are done by women. Men usually help in fertilizer and pesticide application. Akanda 

[9] in his study found that highest proportion of the rural women had high participation in 

vegetable cultivation while only 0.5 percent of them had high participation in the cultivation of 

fruit trees. Halim, et al. [10] reported that in Bangladesh, women produced Indian spinach, 

amaranths, okra, gourd, cucumber, and pumpkin during summer season and Country bean, brinjal 

and tomato during winter season in their homestead garden successfully. Shah [11] observed 

that the age of rural women was negatively related to increase the extent of their participation. 

Devi [12] found that education of women had a significant positive impact on labor force 

participation. Rahman [13] observed that level of education of the women had positive 

relationship with their participation in rural development activities. Parvin [14] found that there 

was a significant positive relationship be-tween family size of the farm women and their 

awareness and knowledge on environmental degradation. Rao [15] re-ported that rural women's 

participation in agriculture was positive correlated with the size of their family. Nahar [16] in her 

study found that family income had negative relation-ship with their participation in homestead 

vegetable cultivation, post- harvest practices, poultry rearing and goat rearing. Salauddin [17] in 

his study found that the family income of rural women had significant positive relationship with 

their involvement in homestead vegetable production. Akanda [9] in his study mentioned that 

farm size was one of the activities of rural family and it influenced all over variable. The rural 

women with bigger farm size had more participation in homestead vegetables cultivation, fruit 

tree cultivation and non-farm household activities. The reasons were that these families had more 

opportunities, more education, more agricultural knowledge and better extension contact. Karim 

[18] concluded from a study there was a significant difference in the agricultural knowledge of 

farmers is sugarcane cultivation. Ahsan [19] observed that organizational participation of rural 

women had significant positive relationship with their participation in homestead vegetable 

production. 

 

2.1. Statement of Hypothesis  

A hypothesis simply means a mere assumption or some supposition to be proved or 

Disproved. The following null hypothesis was formulated to explore the association between 

selected characteristics of the women.  

1. "There was no relationship between age of the women and their involvement in   

vegetable cultivation.” 

2. -"There was no relationship between education of the women and their involvement in   

vegetable cultivation" 

3. -"There was no relationship between marital status of the women and their involvement 

in   vegetable cultivation" 

4. -"There was no relationship between farming experience of the women and their 

involvement in   vegetable cultivation" 



Current Research in Agricultural Sciences, 2015, 2(4): 114-122 

 

 

117 
© 2015 Conscientia Beam. All Rights Reserved. 

5. -"There was no relationship between farm size of the women and their involvement in   

vegetable cultivation" 

 

3. MATERIALS AND METHOD 

The study was conducted in Ikorodu Local Government Area of Lagos State. Multistage 

sampling technique was used to select sample for the study. In the first stage, Ikorodu was 

purposively selected based on high concentration of commercial vegetable farmers in this Local 

Government Area. In the second stage, Sabo and Odogunyan areas known for high population of 

vegetable farmers were purposively selected. For the last stage.60 vegetable farmers each were 

randomly selected from Sabo and Odogunyan to make the One hundred and twenty (120) 

vegetable farmers used as sample for the study. Data were collected through a structured 

questionnaire which was administered to vegetables farmers. Information on age, marital status, 

years of formal education, farming experience, gender contribution in vegetable production were 

obtained from the vegetable farmers and pooled for further analysis. The data collected was 

subjected to Gender-based analysis to highlight gender based division of labour in vegetable 

production focusing on workload, access to and control over productive resources and different 

needs, constraints and opportunities of males/females. Association between women participation 

and various socioeconomic variables were ascertained by estimating Pearsons’ correlation 

coefficients employing following formula: 

  







222 XnYXX

YXnYX
r  

Where, r = correlation coefficient, X and Y are the variables between which association is to 

be estimated while X and Y are their mean values. 

 

4. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION 

4.1. Selected Characteristics of Vegetable Farmers 

One of the objectives of the study is to examine demographic and other related characteristics 

of vegetable farmers in the study area. The selected characteristics are age, years of formal 

education, farming experience, marital status and farm size. They are hereby discussed. 

A good number of the statistics in Table 1 reveal some interesting facts about vegetable 

growers in the study area. First, the percentage of females (53.33%) is more than that of males. 

This indicates that Vegetable production is not gender exclusive but is mostly carried out by the 

female folk. Secondly, the percentage of males (91.07%) within the age range of 20-50 years of age 

is higher than that of females within the same cohort of age. This should be expected since it is 

the males that majorly carry out the land preparation activities which are more tedious. This 

conforms to the findings of Busari Ahmed, et al. [20] that in Osun State, Vegetable farmers are 

mostly between 41 and 50 years of age. While the percentage of married females is a little above 

average (51. 56 %), the percentage is as high as 80.36 for males.  



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118 
© 2015 Conscientia Beam. All Rights Reserved. 

Table-1. Selected Characteristics of vegetable farmers 

Source: Field survey  

 

Females are more educated than males as depicted by the higher percentage (53.33%) of the 

former that possess primary and secondary education. It shows that females are more educated 

than males. However, none of the vegetable farmers receives post-secondary education. Females 

also have higher years of farming experience than males perhaps due to the fact that females are 

shown (in the Table) to be more than males in vegetable production. This implies that Vegetable 

farming is not only an occupation but a way of life of the people in the study area.  

Data furnished in Table 6 indicated that the highest pro-portion (56.25%) of women  

belonged to the small farm category compared to 39% having medium farm size and only 4 

percent high farm size. Thus, most (96%) of the respondent women were in small to medium farm 

category. It indicated that majority of the farmer are becoming landless for various reasons of 

which fragmentation of land due to inheritance is major. 

 

4.2. Land holding and Land use Pattern of Farmers 

Table 2 above shows that average farm size in the study area was 0.88 hectare (ha) which 

comprises owned area with an average size of 0.8ha and rented areas with an average size of 

0.07ha. This reveals that majority of the farmers in the study area own less than one hectare of 

land. On an average 11.24 percent of operational holdings was irrigated. Farmers in the area 

 Female Male 

 Frequency Percentages  Frequency Percentages  

Number of vegetable grower  64 53.33 56 46.67 
Age (years)  

20-30   10 15.63   8 14.29 
31-40   34 53.12   30 53.56 
41-50                  12 18.75     13 23.22   
>50   08 12.50   5  8.93 

Marital Status                                                                                 

Single   18 28.13   04 7.14 

Married   33 51.56   45 80.36 
Divorced   13 20.31   07 12.50 
Educational Status   

No formal education   22 34.38  39 69.64 
Primary education   28 43.75  12 21.43 
Secondary education   14 21.86  05 8.93 
Post-Secondary education   0 0  0 0 
Farming Experience (years)   

0-5 12 18.75 05 8.93 
6-10 20 31.25 07 12.50 
11-15 07 10.94 03 5.36 
16-20 07 10.94 06 10.72 

>20 18 28.12 35 62.50 
Farm Size (Ha)     

< 0.5 36 56.25   3   5.36 

0.5-1 20 31.25 31 55.56 
1.1-1.50   6  9.37 16 27.57 
>1.50   2  3.13   7 11.51 



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119 
© 2015 Conscientia Beam. All Rights Reserved. 

allocated comparatively more land to Pumpkin with an average of 0.39ha the least to pepper with 

an average of 0.06ha.  

 

Table-2. Landholding size and distribution 

Characteristics Mean Hectare 

Farming Size and Composition  

Operating Holdings 0.88 
Owned Area 0.81 
Rented Area 0.07 
Irrigated Area  0.10 
Area Under Vegetable Farming  

Amaranthus (Tete) 0.12 
Celosia (Soko) 0.08 
Okra 0.15 
Pumpkin 0.39 
Tomatoes 0.08 

Pepper 0.06 

                                   Source: Field survey 

 

Table-3. Contribution of Male and female to Vegetable Production (man days) 

Vegetable Family Labour Hired Labour Total Overall 
Total Male Female Male Female Male Female 

Amaranthus 46 41 86 60 101 132 233 
Celosia (Soko) 24 36 78 43 79 102 181 
Okra 20 22 100 71 120 93 213 

Pumpkin 40 42 121 50 161 92 253 
Tomatoes 16 18 59 55 75 73 148 
Pepper 10 13 69 76 71 89 160 

 Source: Field survey 

 

Table-4. Distributive Share by Gender in Vegetable Farming 

Activities Total Time  Required (hour) Male (hour) Female (hour) 

Land clearing  287 238 49 
Stumping 167 137 30 
Bed making 252 194 58 
Plating 92 49 43 
Fertilizer application 83 21 62 

Watering 203 46 157 
Weeding 119 54 65 
Thinning 90 48 47 

Supplying 93 39 54 
Harvesting 139 62 77 
Transportation 129 75 54 
Marketing 173 58 115 
Total time 1827 1041 786 

           Source: Field survey 

 

Data in Table 3 indicated that family females and hired male labour was mostly used in 

commercial vegetable production. In Pumpkin, Okra and Tomatoes production men have a 

reasonable involvement and were contributing 161, 120 and 75 man days while females have 



Current Research in Agricultural Sciences, 2015, 2(4): 114-122 

 

 

120 
© 2015 Conscientia Beam. All Rights Reserved. 

more involvement in Amaranthus, Celosia (Soko) and Pepper production. Overall 253 man-days 

are involved in Pumpkin production which is the highest while the least man-day (148) was 

devouted to tomatoes production. The result presented in table 4 above shows that while men are 

heavily involved in vegetable production activities such as land clearing, stumping, bed making 

and transportation, women are more involved in crop management activities of production such 

as weeding watering, supplying, transplanting, harvesting and marketing. This conforms to the 

result of Hassan, et al. [6] and Mofeke, et al. [7]. 

 

Table-5. Estimates of correlation between women participation and selected socio-economic variables 

Variable Participation 

Age 0. 648** 

Education -0.014 

Marital Status 0.726** 

Farming Experience 0.735** 

Farm Size 0.563** 

     Source: Field survey. ** Significant at 1% level of probability  

 

Pearson correlation coefficient of the relationship between selected characteristics of 

participants and vegetable farming are reported in Table 5. The significant level was set at 0.01 

level of probability for all relationship examined thus. For the first null hypothesis-"There was no 

relationship between age of the women and their involvement in   vegetable cultivation", the 

concerned two variables were positively related and significant as the computed value of "r" = 

0.648 was higher than tabulated value with 98 degrees of freedom at 0.0I level of probability. 

Hence, the concerned null hypothesis was rejected. It was concluded that age of the women had 

significant positive relationship with their participation in vegetable production. The 

interpretation is that the people who were aged have much involvement with the activities. 

Because aged women are eager to increase their family income. Second null hypothesis states 

"There was no relationship between education of the women and their participation in vegetable 

production”. The relationship between the concerned two variables was negative and insignificant 

as the computed value of "r" = -0.014 was lower than tabulated value with 98 degrees of freedom 

at 0.01 level of probability. Hence, the concerned null hypothesis could not be rejected. It was 

therefore, concluded that education of the women had no significant relationship with their 

participation in vegetable production. The third hypothesis that "There was no relationship 

between marital status of the women and their participation in vegetable production” was rejected 

because the relationship between the concerned two variables was positively significant as the 

computed value of "r" = 0.726 was higher than tabulated value with 98 degrees of freedom at 0.01 

level of probability. It was, concluded that marital status of the women had significant positive 

relationship with their participation in vegetable production. This indicates that respondents who 

are married participate more in vegetable production. On the fourth hypothesis, "There was no 

relationship between farm experience and their participation in vegetable production"; the 

computed value of "r" = 0.735 was higher than tabulated value with 98 degrees of freedom at 0.01 

level of probability. Hence, the concerned null hypothesis was rejected because of the significantly 



Current Research in Agricultural Sciences, 2015, 2(4): 114-122 

 

 

121 
© 2015 Conscientia Beam. All Rights Reserved. 

positive relationship between the two variables. It was concluded that farm experience had 

significant positive relationship with their participation in vegetable production, indicating that 

the more experienced the women are, the more will be their participation in vegetable production. 

Finally, the hypothesis that "There was no relationship between farm size of the women and their 

participation in vegetable production" was tested. The relationship between the concerned two 

variables was positively significant as the computed value of "r" = 0.563 was higher than 

tabulated value with 98 degrees of freedom at 0.01 level of probability. Hence, the concerned null 

hypothesis was rejected. It was concluded that farm size had significant positive relationship with 

participation in vegetable production. This indicates that the women with large farm size tend to 

participate more in vegetable production.  This might be as a result of the fact that, the women 

who have large farm size are able to grow cereal crops and can easily get involved in vegetable 

production. 

 

5. CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATION 

This study analyzed gender issues of labour participation in vegetable production in Ikorodu 

local government area of Lagos State. From the study, it can be concluded that that although 

women dominated in some operations of vegetable cultivation but in totality male participation 

was found more prominent. The role of women in majority of the cases was supportive in nature 

while the dominative role in most of the cases was performed by men. Tested hypothesis revealed 

age, marital status, farm experience and farm size are positively related to women participation in 

vegetable production in the study area while education is negatively related to women 

participation in vegetable production.   It is suggested that projects and programmes that aim to 

increase vegetable production should be designed to address the complementary roles that men 

and women farmers play. 

 

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