An Assessment of People’s Participation in Agricultural Policy Formulation and Implementation: A Case Study of Benue State

The study was aimed at assessing peopleʹs participation in agricultural policy formulation and implementation. The research was directed towards determining the awareness and level of involvement of farmers in policy formulation, implementation and monitoring and also to identify the problems of implementing and monitoring these policies. The study was carried out in Makurdi, Benue state. Primary data used for the study were obtained by interviewing 110 farmers who were randomly selected; structured questionnaires were used for interview. The data were analyzed using simple descriptive statistics such as frequencies and percentages to ascertain the level of awareness and level of participation in the policy processes. The study showed that farmers were usually involved in the problem identification stage of policy formulation. The study also showed that majority of the farmers were involved in the implementation of agricultural policy and not very many of them were involved in monitoring of the implemented policies. The hypothesis of the study showed that there is a significant relationship between awareness and implementation of agricultural policies in Makurdi. It was recommended that government should discourage top-down approach of policy formulation; the community should be involved in the policy monitoring process.