Abstract:
Ghana’s agriculture is characterized by low productivity, low farm incomes and low levels
of technological adoption and use of inefficient production techniques. This poor state of
Ghana’s agriculture is related to farmers’ attitudes towards risk in the adoption of new
production techniques, as well as risk in the production and socioeconomic environment.
Having realized that poverty is a major constraining factor in the farmer’s production and
socio-economic environment, the study therefore sought specifically to: measure the
poverty situation among cassava farmers in the study area; analyze the risk attitudes of
cassava farmers and determine the effect of poverty on risk attitudes of the farmers. The
study area is Awutu Senya District. A random sampling technique was used for the
selection of respondents. Data were generated using structured interviews and field visits.
The collected data were analyzed using descriptive statistics, the Foster Greer Thorbecke
poverty measures, Equal Certainty Equivalent Risk Model and regression analysis to
determine the effects of poverty on the risk attitude of farmers. The result showed that
58% of farmers in the study area were poor and 31% measured the depth or extent of
poverty as indicated by the FGT poverty measure. Furthermore, using the equal certainty
equivalent risk model of assessing farmers’ risk attitudes the study revealed that, as many as 82% of the farmers was risk averse. The result of regression analysis also suggested
that age, household size, educational level, land size and degree of poverty were
significant determinants of farmers’ attitude towards risks. Poverty situation was found to
be positively related farmers attitude towards risk. It is therefore, recommended that the
government and private sector should initiate policy that strengthens existing programmes
on alternative income generating activities within the broad framework of its poverty
alleviation strategy to improve farmers’ income. With improved income farmers should be
able to improve on their risk management skill to mitigate the effect of perceived risky
situation they find themselves
