Market participation of urban agriculture producers and its impact on poverty: Evidence from Ghana

Abstract

This paper aimed to investigate the impact of urban agriculture commercialisation on poverty and assess the determinants of urban farmers’ market outlet choice. A total of 480 urban farmers were selected for this study. Household Commercialisation Index (HCI) was used, and the Foster-Greer-Thorbecke (FGT) model was adopted to analyse poverty. The Two-Stage Least Squares Regression (2SLS) and the heteroskedastic linear regression models were used to analyse the effect of urban agriculture commercialisation on poverty. Probit and Bivariate Probit Models were applied to determine the factors influencing the marketing outlet choice of farmers. The results revealed that age, gender, educational level, experience, household size, household food security and commercialisation significantly influence urban poverty. Also, educational level, postharvest losses, commercialisation, storage ability, grading and sorting, minutes to the nearest market, extension contacts and nature of roads influenced market outlet choice. The study recommended that government, traditional leaders, and other vital stakeholders should integrate urban farming into urban development policies for sustainable poverty reduction in urban areas of developing countries.

Keywords

• Commercialisation
• Poverty
• Marketing outlet
• Commercialisation index
• Urban agriculture