The Impacts Of Agricultural Cooperatives On Poverty Alleviation Of Smallholder Farmers In Rural Togo

Togo in general,and Northern Togo in particular,are characterized by high rate of poverty.Unemployment is also one of the main problems facing many people in Togo.To get rid of poverty and employment,most people use farming as tool to reduce poverty,ensure food security and create employment in their communities.Because of high production and marketing costs,Farmers often find it difficult to pool resources to increase farm income and greatly improve their living conditions.To address this,farmers have formed cooperatives to pool resources to increase agricultural productivity,create jobs and reduce poverty.Since 2012 the number of agriculture cooperative have increase significantly.The study analyze the impact of agricultural cooperatives in poverty reduction among smallholder farmers in Togo.The study was a combination of both qualitative and quantitative research method.The results of the descriptive analysis show that the socioeconomic characteristics of farmers have affected the role of agricultural cooperatives in reducing poverty.Studies have also shown that agricultural cooperatives play an important role in reducing poverty in household member.Respondents responded positively to the effectiveness of cooperatives in reducing poverty.The study also showed that cooperatives have a significant role in creating employment opportunities.Using cross-sectional data of 531 collected from the Northern Togo.We use farmers’ agricultural income as poverty reduction indicators to measure the impact of members of agricultural cooperatives by implementing propensity score matching(PSM).The probit estimation reveal that the age Household head,Household head education level,Off-farm income,Household head owning Oxen has a positive and Distance to the nearest market has a positive impact of household member joining agricultural cooperative while household cultivated land size has a negative impact of household member joining a cooperative.Using the Kernel algorithm,the results showed that there is a significant difference,in Agriculture income between cooperative members and nonmembers.Moreover Endogenous Switching Regression(ESR)estimation techniques indicates that agricultural cooperative membership has a heterogeneous impact on poverty alleviation among its members.Indeed the results of ESR estimation reveal that cooperative membership is effective at alleviating poverty for more-educated household heads that have a larger land size and live closer to the nearest market.Finally the study found that Cooperatives were facing various challenges which impact their success in poverty reduction.Some of the challenges include;market access,lack of funding,conflicts within cooperatives.The study concludes by recommending different strategies that will improve the success of cooperatives in reducing poverty.The government should invest more in training cooperative farmers,including knowledge of production,marketing and management.Non-government organization should be used to provide professional services for cooperatives.Cooperatives must cooperate with research institute in order to determine and develop suitable agricultural practices and machines.Land right transfer and land consolidation can be included in government land policies in order to reduce land fragmentation.