Comparative Analysis of Rainfed and Dry Season Rice Farming in Value Chain Development Programme in Ayamelum Local Government Area-Anambra State

Nigeria agricultural sector rely heavily on rainfed farming system, this has seen a wide gap in the annual rice demand-supply trend in the country. Thus, the importance of the study on comparative analysis of rainfed and dry season rice farming in value chain development programme in Ayamelum Local Government Area, which focused primarily on socioeconomic characteristics, profitability, and challenges faced by rice farmers in the area cannot be overemphasized. The study used a multi-stage sampling technique to elicit information from 70 rainfed and 30 dry season rice farmers. Combination of statistical tools of the descriptive, budgetary model and inferential statistics of unequal variance t-test was utilized. The finding had a mean age was 47 years and 46 years for rainfed and dry season respectively. This suggests that dry season rice farmers are younger in the area. Also, the mean farming experience was found to be 11 years and 15 years, this equally suggest that dry season rice farmers are better experienced in the area. The mean farm size of 1.98ha for rainfed against 1.14ha for dry season rice farming suggests that more lands are available for rainfed rice farming. Furthermore, the difference in profit was N72, 794.81 significant at t-value of 22.83**. Some of the challenges recorded by rain-fed rice farmers include; cattle menace, high cost of labour, and competition. The challenges recorded by dry season rice farmers include; high cost of pumping machine, more incidence of birds attack, and high cost of inputs. Evidently, dry season rice farming is more profitable.