Abstract

In modern farming business in Nigeria, provision of agricultural credit is not enough but efficient use of such credit has become an important factor .to increase productivity. Meanwhile, the absence of rural banks or their unwillingness to meet credit needs of rural farmers largely account for the wide influence of informal lending institutions on agricultural production in the rural areas. As a result, this research will examine the loan acquisition and repayment performance among small scale farmers. This study was carried out in Yewa-North Local Government Area of Ogun State to identify the various ways available to the respondents to acquire the loan necessary, evaluate the impact of the loan on the farmer’s productivity and determine the factors influencing their payment performance of loan acquired. Therefore, combinations of primary and secondary data were used for the study with the help of a multi-stage sampling technique, hence a total sum of eighty (80) respondents were sampled for the study, whereas both descriptive and inferential statistics were employed to analyze the data generated from the field survey. The result revealed that small-scale farmers in the study area have access to different sources of loan which include NACRDB, OSAMCA, Cooperatives, friends and Relatives, whereas a lot of problems were identified to be responsible for inability of farmers to access these sources with eventual high rate of loan default even when they actually have the opportunity. However, there should be proper monitoring and supervision from the parties involved in order to ensure proper use of loan collected and guide against loan default and government should provide more avenues by which farmers can get the loan necessary with less procedure and with little or no collateral security thereby causing the interest rate on the existing sources to reduce.

Key Words: Loan, Performance, Repayment, Pattern, Cooperative Societies, Acquisition