Assessment of Rural Women Farmers’ Knowledge on Selected Soya Bean Products and Accessibility to Nutrition Education Sources in Ekiti State, Nigeria

Authors

Olalekan Odefadehan Dr., Federal University of Technology, Akure/ Landmark University , Omun Aran, Kwara State, NigeriaFollow
Temitope Omoyungbo, Federal University of Technology, Akure
Ayotunde Owolabi, Landmark University , Omun Aran , Kwara State
Tolulope Akinbobola, Federal University of Technology, Akure

Date of this Version

3-2-2021

Abstract

This study assessed the accessibility to nutrition education sources and level of knowledge on soya bean products as alternative/cheap source of protein by rural women. Multistage sampling procedure was utilized in selecting 234 respondents in the study area. Interview schedule and focus group discussion was used to collect information from the rural women. Data was analysed through descriptive statistics (percentages, frequencies and means) and inferential statistics (Analysis of variance). The results showed that the women had access to nutrition education on soya beans mostly through; family and friends (x̅= 0.82), local health centres (x̅= 0.78), radio (x̅= 0.80) and television (x̅= 0.71) programmes. The women had overall ‘below average’ knowledge on the products. There was no significant difference in the knowledge scores of the women across the three products (soya milk, iru and cake) (F= 0.167, p≥ 0.05). The result of the bivariate analysis indicated that local health centres (P = 0.035) and Women in Agriculture (P = 0.019) were nutrition education sources whose accessibility had a significant relationship with the level of soya bean product knowledge of the rural women. There is an urgent need for an aggressive campaign on the soya product nutrition education programme in order to increase the knowledge of this important and cheap protein source.