Benefits of the National Special Programme for Food Security in Niger State, Nigeria

The study examined the benefits of the National Special Programme for Food Security (NSPFS) in Niger State, Nigeria. A total of 180 respondents were selected using multistage sampling technique. The project sites were chosen purposively comprising of all the nine sites of NSPFS in Niger State, namely; Nassarawa, Batavovogi, Lenfa-Bororo, Gidan-Mangoro, Garam, Mankangara, Lioji, Kaboji and Shambo. The respondents were selected proportionately based on each site’s activities. Data collection lasted from 15th February, 2013 to 31st August, 2013. Data were analyzed using descriptive statistics such as percentages and means, frequency distribution and t-test. The results of the analysis showed an indication that the NSPFS performed well. The beneficiaries were satisfied with the implementation of the following components: agro-input support, extension and financial services. NSPFS significantly improved the crop output of beneficiaries as compared to non-beneficiaries. The benefits that accrued to the beneficiaries of the programme ranges from credit grant to farmers to provision of storage facilities which translated into increased outputs. The following recommendations were made based on the major findings of the study. The NSPFS should focus more attention on mechanization, storage facilities, agro-processing, marketing, small scale irrigation, and infrastructure, because it will help the benefitting famers to actualize their pre-determined goals, it will also improve their well-being.

to formal education, sustained cooperative endeavours; balanced family household; appropriately addressed gender and family roles; rampant poverty: appropriate social, political and economic discrimination; longer life expectance, enabling values and attitudes; distribution of wealth . He concludes that, "societies with low levels of social organization and weak systems of human capital formation have high levels of food insecurity". Successful food security and poverty-oriented programmes did not only assist poor rural population to produce more and diversified products, but to produce a surplus that can be marketed and thereby generate income for the purposes of improving quality of life through improved diet and nutrition investment in productive activities; and as collateral for credit to purchase inputs or other supplies to enhance agricultural or non-agricultural enterprise.

Food Security Framework
According to the USAID policy paper entitled "Food aid and food security" (1999), to range of important issues, which lead to the food insecurity of households and individuals in the developing world, Nigeria inclusive, are among others: chronic poverty, rapid population growth, declining per capita food output, poor infrastructure, ecological constraint, limited arable land, inappropriate policies, disease, poor water sanitation, inadequate nutritional knowledge, civil war and ethnic conflicts. The complexity of the food security problem in developing countries suggests the need to develop a framework, which leads to a consistent analysis of the actual mechanisms that undermine the food security of specific population groups. Food security framework highlighted by USAID in 2010, was pointed in three dimensions ways namely; (a) availability, (b) access, (c) utilization, and nature of their relationship to one another, as well as a brief description of their determinants. Food availability is a function of the combination of domestic food stocks, commercial food imports, food aid and domestic food production as well as the underlying determinants of each of these factors. Use of the term availability is often confusing, since it can refer to food supplies available at both the household level and at a more aggregate (regional and national) level. However, the term is applied most commonly in reference to food supplies at the regional or national level.
Food access is influenced by the aggregate availability of food through the latter's impact on supplies in the market and, therefore, on market prices. This is further determining by the ability of households to obtain food from their own production and stocks, from the market, and from other sources. These factors are in turn, determined by the resource endowment of the household which defines the set of productive activities they can pursue in meeting their income and food security objectives (Aneke, 2007). Food access is also a function of physical environment, social environment and policy environment, which determine how effectively households are able to utilize their resources to meet their food security objectives. Drastic changes in these conditions, such as during periods of drought or social conflict, may seriously disrupt production strategies and threaten the food access of affected households. These shocks often lead to the loss of productive assets such as livestock, which have severe implications for the future productive potential of households and, therefore, their long-term food security (Oni et al., 2009) Food utilization, which is typically reflected in the nutritional status of an individual, is determined by the quantity and quality of dietary intake, general child care and feeding practices, along with health status and its determinants. In any given context, food security concerns may be due to either inadequate physical availability of food supplies, poor access among a specific segment of the population, or inadequate utilization. The conceptual frameworks are in hierarchy of causal factors which ultimately influence the various dimension of food insecurity (Omonona & Agoi, 2007).

Monitoring and Evaluation System of Food Security in Nigeria
Fairly standard and useful breakdown of the monitoring and evaluation system of food security for understanding the various elements of food security intervention programmes: Programme inputs refer to the set of resources, physical facilities, equipment's, and operational policies that enable programme services to be delivered. In the NSPFS programme, the inputs include ADP staff, facilities (Oni et al., 2009). Programme processes refer to the set of activities, or functional areas, through which programme inputs are used to obtain the expected results of the programme. These processes can be broken down according to special function areas, which are fairly generic in their application across programme types, including management, supervision of various components of the programme, counterpart training, logistics, and service delivery, as well as information systems (Aneke, 2007).
Programme outputs refer to the results of programme activities at the programme level, regarding the quality and quantity of goods and services delivered under the programme. Programme outputs may refer to: Specific functional area activities, such as the number of supervisory visit completed the number of health or extension staff trained, or the quantity of food delivered to a warehouse. Service outputs, related to the access to and quality of the services provided, such as ability to increase the number of programme locations, the average distance to service delivery points, assessments of the knowledge and practice of service providers and other measures of service quantity and quality. The degree of service utilization by programme beneficiaries, which always including; the number of people given loan, percentage of households adopting a recommended agricultural technology package (Idachaba, 2004). Programme impact or performance refer to the set of results, such as changes in access Journal of Biology, Agriculture and Healthcare www.iiste.org ISSN 2224-3208 (Paper) ISSN 2225-093X (Online) Vol.11 No.6, 2021 to and quality of resources, changes in behaviour, improvements in well-being that occur at the beneficiary level and that can be directly attributed to programme activities and outputs. While basic food security conditions may improve over the life of the intervention, perhaps as a result of external process, it is the attribution of some elements of those changes to programme activities that constitutes the basis of the term impact in monitoring and evaluation ground (Oni et al., 2009).
Programme impacts can be further broken down to distinguish: Performance on capability, which is referred to as intermediate-level programme outcomes; this include improvements in the access to, or quality of resources, and improvements in the knowledge and practices of beneficiaries. These intermediate performances provide beneficiaries with the necessary tools to bring about sustainable improvements in their own food security status and general well-being (Aneke, 2007). Increases in irrigated area resulting from NSPFS, improved access to working capital as part of micro-enterprise development activities, as well as the improved knowledge and change in behaviour of farmers , which can result from education and training efforts are examples of programme performance which influencing beneficiary capabilities, the performance on well-being, which refers to the final programme result at the beneficiary level that are directly related to their food security status and well-being (Okereke, 2012).
The impacts of emergency feeding programmes may be measured in terms of their influence on the consumption levels of intended beneficiaries, whereas the impacts of agricultural programmes may best be measured in terms of changes in crop yields, food production, and incomes. For health and nutrition-related programmes, impacts on well-being may best be expressed by improvements in nutritional status, as well as reduced morbidity, mortality and fertility. In any monitoring and evaluation system, it will be necessary to identify and monitor indicators that represent key inputs, process and outputs in addition to impacts. The ability of programmes to effectively transform inputs into output will determine the effectiveness of the programme in terms of its impacts at the beneficiary level (IFPRI, 2004). Without knowing who received what quantity and quality of services and at what cost, it is difficult to interpret the results of impact evaluations in a way that directly support decision-making. Indicators of inputs and outputs are typically derived from the routine monitoring of programmebased data and reflect the efficiency of the programme performance. In contrast, impact indicators are typically derived from information at the beneficiary-level (i.e from participating households or individuals) (Wibberley, 2005).

Statement of the Problem
National Special Programme for Food Security was designed to be implemented in phases. It began to work with group of farmers on a pilot scale at few selected sites in each participating country with the intention that, the piloting should then be progressively extended to all major agro-ecological regions. The programme was scaledup to attain full national coverage, giving particular attention to policy and institutional reforms which would address constraints and create a supportive environment for the expansion of small-scale farmers output (Special Programme for Food Security (SPFS, 2003).
The Federal Government of Nigeria plans to extend the NSPFS to other areas of the country at the end of the pilot phase in line with one of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) which is to eradicate extreme poverty and hunger by halving the proportion of people in Nigeria whose income are very low to come by, thereby reducing the proportion of people who suffer from hunger between 1990 and 2015 (MDGs, 2004). Nigeria is blessed with fertile land (Vision, 2010) but, yet cannot provide enough food for her teeming populace, unless complemented with net food importation (Yusuf, Baba, Mohammed & Dogondaji, 2009). In the early 60's to mid-80's Nigeria had the ability to meet up with her food requirements. All of a sudden, something went wrong (Oni, Pender, Philips, & Kato, 2009). Therefore, if there will be sufficient food supply for her citizenry, certain checks must be put in place.
This study aims at examining the benefits of the National Special Programme for Food Security in Niger State. The State plays a vital role as an agrarian State that possesses fertile agricultural land as a cherished asset whose potentials in securing food productions are yet to be fully exploited (Vision, 2010). Based on the foregoing, it can be said that despite the great potential that the State has in resolving food crisis, pockets of the population are still food insecure. Does this mean that the NSPFS programme like the previous programmes has not benefiting as expected?

Objectives of the Study
The broad objective of this study was to examine the benefits of the National Special Programme for Food Security (NSPFS) in Niger State, Nigeria. The specific objectives of this study will be to: 1. identify the specific benefits of the programme that accrued to the beneficiaries of the programme; 2. determine the food security status of the beneficiaries in the study area.

Research Questions
The following two research questions were raised for the study 1. What specific benefits of the programme that accrued to the beneficiaries of the programme? 2. What is the food security status of the beneficiaries in the study area?

Methodology
This study adopted descriptive research of survey design which comprises of selected farmers in Niger state. Multistage sampling procedure was employed in the selection of respondents for the study. The first stage involved purposive selection of the programme sites in the three agricultural zones in the State namely; Zones I, II, and III. There were nine project sites in the whole State. The second stage involved the selection of L.G.As in the respective project sites. This selection was purposive because, only L.G.As where project sites are domiciled was selected. The third stage involved the purposive selection of farming communities/villages that had benefited from the programme. The field survey indicated that, the State have nine sites which comprise of farming communities/villages that have benefitted from the programme. All the nine sites formed the sampling frame for the purpose of this research work, namely: Nassarawa, Batavovogi, Lenfa-Bororo, Gidan-Mangoro, Garam, Makangara, Lioji, Kaboji, and Shambo. The benefitting communities were purposively selected as follows: From Zone I (with headquarters in Nasarawa), three sites, namely, Nasarawa, Batavovogi and Lenfa-Bororo were selected; while Gidan-Mangoro, Garam and Makangara were purposively selected from Zone II with headquarters at Gidan-Mangoro. From Zone III, (whose headquarters was located in Lioji) the following sites were purposively selected Lioji, Kaboji and Shambo respectively. A total of 180 respondents were selected for the study. The data used for the study were from primary and secondary sources. Data were collected from the respondents using interview schedules (for the non-formal educated farmers) and the questionnaire (for the formal educated farmers) containing both open and close ended questions. The data collected for the study were analyzed using descriptive statistics and t-test for the hypothesis formulated for the study.

Results and Discussion
Benefits of the Programme This study found that farmers under the NSPFS benefitted from input supplies. The input supplies include credit facilities, improved agro-seeds and agro-chemicals. The following section attempted to discuss the benefits that accrued to the beneficiaries.

Credit Facility
Results of access by respondents to credit facilities are presented in Table 1. Results in Table 1 showed that majority i.e (64.44%) of the respondents had access to credit, while (35.56%) of the respondents did not have access to credit facilities. A research work undertook by Oyedele and Akintola, (2012) showed that majority (53.30%) of the farmers had access to NSPFS credit while (46.70%) did not have access to credit under the programme. Their research finding agreed with this research work, which showed that majority of the respondents had access to credit facilities. The implication is that, the respondents will able to expand their farm sizes, hire labour, purchase agro-inputs and have enough capital bases that could improve their livelihoods.

Actual Amount of Credit Facilities Received
The actual amounts of funds loaned out to respondents are shown in Table 2. www.iiste.org ISSN 2224-3208 (Paper) ISSN 2225-093X (Online) Vol.11 No.6, 2021 Results obtained in Table 2 showed that, 42.24 % of the respondents obtained between N 40,001 -N 60, 000, 22.41% received N 20,001 -N 40,000, while 15.52% had access to N 60,000 -N 80,000. Results further showed that a total of 10.35% of the respondents had access to N 80,000 -N 100,000 and lastly 7.76% of the farmers in the study area had access to greater than N 100,000. This implies that loans made available to respondents were of small nature. The loans were meant to enable respondents acquire production inputs. This research work also corroborated the findings of Adebayo, (2010) who found that 35.00% of the beneficiaries affirmed that the credit given to them was too small, while 31.67% of the beneficiaries opined the interest rate charged was too high, 15.00% of the beneficiaries complained that the payback period was too short, 13.33% said it was time consuming to obtain the credit, while 5% of the beneficiaries said the credit facility met them in a wrong time. Smallness of loan could constrain or impede growth and expansion of enterprise.

Credit Facilities in Kind during the Cropping Season
The credit facilities in kind are given to the farmers to encourage them to produce more across the various components. Results in Table 3 indicated that agro-chemicals ranked the highest in terms of material supplied in kind with (45.00%) followed by good seeds (36.11%) and stem cuttings (23.89%), and a total of (18.89%) received good seedling, (1.11%) other materials. The implication is that, it helps the respondents to augment their meager resources given that they experience paucity of resources which compel them to over rely on household resources.

Agro-enterprises Introduced
The NSPFS also introduced agro-enterprises in the project sites. These are summarized in Table 4. Results in Table 4 indicated that a greater proportion, i.e 86.67% of the farmers benefitted from agro-forestry community orchards, while 13.33% did not benefitted. A total of 85.56% directly benefitted from livestock fattening, while 14.44% of the farmers did not participate in rearing farm animals, 34.44% of the farmers obtained direct agro-forestry community nurseries, while larger proportion (65.56%) of the sampled farmers were not involved in agro-forestry community nurseries, 25.56% of the respondents benefitted from fishery, whereas, 74.44% of the farmers did not participate in fishery production, one could presume may be due to inadequate water in their domain, 4.44% of the respondents were able to benefit from the programme by obtaining direct woodlot from the programme, meanwhile, 95.56% were not able to have access. Agro-enterprises help to empower the farmers, and this enabled farmers to augment their incomes to meet their basic needs. It is a diversification strategy adopted by the farmers. In addition, the benefitting farmers were also engaged in livestock fattening enterprises as it improved their livelihoods and also created room to serve as a source of dietary protein. The agro-inputs benefitted were summarized in Table 5. Results in Table 5 showed that, 47.22% of the participating farmers obtained agro-inputs support and such agro-inputs support include fertilizers, herbicides, improved maize seeds, knapsack sprayers etc. Also, other incentives given to them include storage facilities such as; iron silos, storage bins, and concealed containers. A total of 21.11% of the total sampled farmers benefitted from storage facilities.

Agro-inputs benefitted from N.S.P.F.S by Farmers
Furthermore, 21.67% of the total respondents benefitted from mechanization services rendered. The mechanization services rendered include boreholes, sprayers, and farm machines e.g tractor services. In like manner, the programme equally rendered extension and financial services to the farmers sampled in the three agricultural zones, 46.11% of the farmers benefitted from it, while, 53.89% did not.
Results further revealed that 27.22% of the farmers benefitted from agro-enterprise development. Also, only a very small proportion (0.59%) of sampled respondents benefitted from small scale irrigation such as; surface and channel irrigation. The study also showed that, rice, groundnut and cassava processing machines were introduced to the farmers to help them in farm produce processing. About 13.89% of them benefitted from it. Only 1.11% benefitted from infrastructures and 5.56% of the respondents benefitted from farm marketing/storage facilities programme. This implies that lacks of storage facilities have been implicated to be responsible for post-harvest losses.

Test of Hypothesis
Ho: There is no significant difference in the crop output of beneficiaries and non-beneficiaries respondents  Table 6 indicated that the computed t-value was 4.5880 which was greater than the critical t-value of 1.658 at 0.05 probability level and 63 degrees of freedom. The null hypothesis is hereby rejected. The implication is that, the outputs obtained by the two groups of the farmers were different because the beneficiaries had access to production inputs such as fertilizers, agrochemicals, credit facilities among others which increased their productivity.

Conclusion and Recommendations
The study concludes that the beneficiaries were satisfied with the implementation of the following components: agro-input support, extension and financial services. NSPFS significantly improved the crop output of beneficiaries as compared to non-beneficiaries. The benefits that accrued to the beneficiaries of the programme ranges from credit grant to farmers to provision of storage facilities, which translated into increased outputs. The following recommendations were made based on the major findings of the study. The NSPFS should focus more attention on mechanization, storage facilities, agro-processing, marketing, small scale irrigation, and infrastructure, because it will help the benefitting famers to actualize their pre-determined goals, it will also improve their wellbeing.