Gender disaggregated impact of farm characteristics and safety practices on milk income in Bushenyi district

Abstract

Despite the importance of the diary sector in improving livelihoods of people through income generation, it is still faced by numerous challenges such as low milk prices, post-harvest losses, poor transport networks, poor animal breeds and the biggest of all is poor safety assurances measures. The study was conducted in four districts of Bushenyi, Kampala, Rukungiri and Buhweju where 50 households were randomly selected from each district making it 200 households to participate in the study. The findings indicated that more men were involved in the dairy sector than men in all districts were. The results even showed that Bushenyi and Rukungiri are as good in milk production just like Kampala unlike Buhweju. The rate of farmers’ participation in groups and Sacco’s is still low for all sex and in all districts. The simple linear regression model indicated that revenue from milk is mainly impacted by the feeding method, age of farmers, total land allocation to dairy enterprise, safety practices and slightly by animal breed kept. Local breeds of cattle were least kept, followed by exotic and improved cattle breed was highly reared in all districts. This study concludes by recommending farmers to join Sacco has and keep exotic breeds to increase on thief earnings from the dairy enterprise.