Abstract

The aim of this study is to investigate the energy consumption pattern of rural households in southwestern Nigeria.A four-stage sampling technique was used to select respondents. Three states (Ogun, Osun and Ondo states) with highest concentration density of forest in southwestern Nigeria were purposively selected. Twenty five villages were randomly selected from Ogun (15), Ondo (5) and Osun (5) proportionate to size in the forest areas. Finally, 430 households were randomly selected from Ogun (272), Ondo (89) and Osun (69) states.The descriptive statistics and Ordinary Least square model was employed to identify the determinants of energy as well as sociological and economic variables influencing major energy sources in the study area. Age of household was 47.6 ± 11.6 years and household size was 7.0± 4.0 persons. Majority of the household heads were male (92.1%), married (89.5%) with 2.4 ± 5.0 years of education and19.9 ± 14.9 years of residency in the forest area. The empirical research showed that fuelwood (83.0) had highest energy dependency followed by charcoal (33.7). Implying that rural people used more of forest sourced energy than any other form of energy sources. Furthermore education level (59.0%), year of residency (10.4%) and member of association (89.5%) influenced energy consumption pattern in the study area at various significant levels.

Key Words:  Consumption, Dependency, Energy, Forest, Households, Pattern