Assessment of marketing efficiency of fish in urban markets in Central Uganda : the gender perspective

Abstract

The major purpose of the study was to assess the marketing efficiency of urban fish markets in Central Uganda through the gender lens. The specific objectives of the study were to: characterize fish traders based on gender; determine market performance of fish traders, and; establish the relationship between gender of fish traders and marketing efficiency. Primary data was collected a sample of fish traders operating in Kampala markets of Kalerwe, Kawempe, and Bwaise. A well-designed questionnaire was used to collect data from 90 fish traders. Data was coded for completeness, and processed using computer software called the Statistical Package for Social Scientists (SPSS). Descriptive statistics, frequencies, percentages, regression models were used to analyse the primary data. The statistics were computed and utilised to interpret the data. The results showed that both males, females and youth are equally participating in house hold production because of the increase in responsibilities to both parties. The results also carry a sense of great gender equality in the area. This also justifies the fact that there are no differences between male, female and the youth traders as both earn from fish trade. The research findings further indicate that gross margin of tilapia per kilogram (i.e. price sold minus price bought) was significantly higher for female fish traders than for male fish traders. The different types of fish popularly sold in the markerts within Kawempe region are Tilapia, Catfish and Nile perch. Across locations, evidence from the study analysis shows that the highest mean margin for a kilogram of tilapia sold as per exchange rate of 1 USD equaling to 3600 Ugandan shillings was in Kalerwe ($1.65 ± 2.88) and lowest in Kawempe ($0.63 ± 1.85). For catfish sales in Kawempe, female fish traders reported significantly higher daily margins than male retailers = 5.344, p = 0.000]. Results of the correlation analysis indicates that there is a significant and positive relationship between gender of fish traders and marketing efficiency. For example, there is a high correlation of(r=0.890, P<0.000), which implies that the availability of household help from family members for both Female fish women and male fish men exhibited negative association with the dependent variable (p = 0.00) and therefore amount of sales made by the traders was consistent regardless of availability or absence of household help for all genders. The study recommends that Uganda has a huge potential for profitable trade among traders of different gender. However regardless of the decreased gender gap among fish traders, there is still significant difference between the genders in terms of profitability with male traders being slightly more profitable than their female counterparts and the youth. Also there is a more likelihood to deal with a male fish trader than any other gender which depicts uneven distribution of the genders across the markets.