Abstract

Aim: The study was carried out to investigate the financial feasibility for young graduates to engage in production so as to reduce unemployment rate in Ibadan metropolis.

Materials and Methods: It was adopted survey method to generate data. Four wards were randomly selected within the metropolis, in each of the wards, five nurseries were randomly selected; in each nursery, questionnaires was administered to at least four workers. Eighty well-structured questionnaires were administered in all. Descriptive statistics were utilized to analyse the socio-economic variables, while Gross Income (GI), and Net Income (NI), were adopted for economic analysis.

Results: The result showed that seedling nurseries business was a means of self-employment opportunities which generates income with relatively low investment expenditure in the study area. Most of the nursery operators were within the ages of 18 and 35 years which composed of youths and few adults; implying that commercial nursery business in the study area was greatly improved upon, since it was concentrated mostly in the hands of the young and agile individuals. The gross margin was ₦83856.25 and benefit cost rate (BCR) of ₦1.74; implicating that for every one naira invested in Forest tree seedlings production, an additional ₦0.74 kobo was realized.  Furthermore, at 5% level of significance, farm size value was positive and significant influence on profit.

Conclusion: It was concluded that inadequate funds and government policies were the major constraints to seedlings production; therefore, there is need for Government and NGOs to assist nursery operators with loans to start up or expand the existing nursery business. It is needed for adoption of this enterprise in order to reduce poverty and unemployment rate in the study area.

Statistics