Abstract

Honey is a natural unrefined sweet food produced by bees from nectar of flowering plants which apart from being delicious and nutritious, has been found useful in many industries especially for pharmaceutical purposes. The focus of the study therefore was to analyze profitability of honey marketing and investigate its market structure. Primary data was used for the study. The study employed descriptive statistics, Gini-coefficient and the Lorenz curve analyses to describe socioeconomic characteristic of the respondents and ascertain the market structure. Budgetary analysis was used to estimate the cost and returns. A total of 244 respondents were interviewed with the aid of structured questionnaire and interviewed guide. The result showed that average age of the respondents was 46.5 years. Majority (84%) were married with average household size of 6 members. The Gini-coefficient value of 0.80 obtained indicated that honey market inclined towards imperfect market structure. The budgetary analysis revealed that on the average, honey marketers generated gross margin of ₦986.67k and profit of ₦716.65k per litre of honey sold. The benefit cost ratio was 1.73, revealing that honey marketing is a very profitable enterprise in the study area. Adulteration of honey and lack of access to finance were the major constraints faced by honey marketers. The study concluded that although honey marketing was found to be a profitable enterprise in the study area, there is evidence of imperfect competition in the market structure.

Key Words: Forest, Marketing, Medicine, Profitability, Honey, Structure