Pages: (57-75 )

Abstract

The study characterized farmer-herder conflict and farm household food security status in Edo State, Nigeria.  308 respondents from two communities that had witnessed the conflict and two that had not, were purposively selected, herders were selected using the snowballing technique. Data were analyzed using descriptive and inferential statistics, Food Consumption Score and Coping Strategy Index. PCA identified six broad conflict causal factors: socioeconomic, production, situational, violation of the agreement, institutional, and ethnocultural. Situational factor and the injury significantly determined the conflict severity of in the conflict stratum while in the herder stratum, production factor was significant. About 83.97% of respondents in the non-conflict stratum were on the good FCS food security status, 66.9% and 66.8% had poor food security in the conflict and herder strata respectively. A post hoc test of the hypothesis showed that conflict caused the difference in household food security among the strata.  Since land was the major cause of the conflict, it is recommended that the communities rent or lease their lands to herders with little or no interference from the government as respondents lacked trust in government interventions. Victims need livelihood restoration due to the huge losses. Backyard livestock keeping by farmers is recommended to improve animal protein consumption while herders are encouraged to diversify their diet.

Keywords: Farmer-herder conflict, Conflict stratum, Non-conflict stratum, Herder stratum, Household food security,

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