Socio-economic factors affecting home gardens as a livelihood strategy in rural areas of the Eastern Cape province, South Africa

Abstract

Home gardens have been identified as one of the possible ways of producing food and offer great solutions to some of the issues surrounding poverty alleviation and improving food security in rural areas. However, home gardens' potential as a living strategy has not been recognized and affected by many factors. Therefore, the study examines socio-economic factors influencing home gardens as a living strategy in rural areas of the Eastern Cape Province. The study was conducted in the Eastern Cape Province rural areas, where data was collected from 200 households using snowball sampling. The study made use of descriptive and logit regression models for analysis. The study results reveal that female households actively participated in home gardens with an average of 46 years. Households were landowners with an average farm size of 3 Ha and owning farm assets. Home gardens contributed immensely to households by providing food for home consumption and generating income from crops and vegetables. The study concludes that Socio-economic factors were the factors influencing home gardens as the living strategy in rural areas. Therefore, the study recommends the provision of external personnel in rural areas to assist home gardeners in improving their productivity.