Market Gardening, Urban Development, and Income Generation on the Jos Plateau, Nigeria

Are their ways to improve small-scale market gardening in and around the city of Jos, Central Nigeria, in order to raise its productivity and income-generating capacity? This question, the relevance of which extends to many other urban areas in sub-Saharan Africa, runs as a common thread through this book. The study demonstrates that the Jos metropolitan area is well endowed with suitable gardening land, irrigation water, human resources and other conditions favorable to the market-oriented production of fruits and vegetables. Nevertheless, many constraints hinder the performance of the horticultural industry. To overcome problems like insecure tenure, inequitable marketing patterns, lack of managerial and technical skills, pollution and inadequate support, requires a multi-facetted and concurrent approach. The authors emphasize the need for small-scale gardeners to mobilize and organize in order to facilitate collective action and effective advocacy; and the need for considerable governmental and institutional support and social engineering. The experience of some Israeli Arabs has demonstrated, however, that under these conditions, achieving a successful transition is not easy.