Paper Title
Women In Economic Development, Food Productivity And Food Processing In Oyo State, Nigeria

Abstract
It is undisputable that the role women played in economic development and food production are quite dominant and prominent and its relevance cannot be overemphasized. This paper therefore examines the contributions of women to national economic growth using four local governments from Oyo town as a case study. This paper made use of both the primary data and secondary data with the aid of a well structured questionnaire administered to some groups of women in farming business. Data collected was analysed using simple descriptive statistical tools such as frequency counts and percentages on socio-economic characteristics of respondents. Findings revealed that more than 85% of women that engage in arable farming and food processing are between the age range of 25 and 60+ years. Most of them are married (93.3%) and had been in the business for a period of 12 years. The paper also investigates the extent at which they had benefited from federal government agricultural transformation agenda programme. The response shows that majority of them are not benefitted from the programme while some are not aware of the programme. The paper therefore recommends that government should empower the women farmers by giving them access to basic economic resources such as land, labour saving machines, food processing machines and credit facilities to boost their quality and quantity output services. Keywords- Economic Development, Food Production, Food Processing, Women in Farming Business