Title: Government Policies And Agripreneurship Growth Of Sme's In River State
Authors: UDEH UZOAMAKA G.
Volume: 9
Issue: 10
Pages: 374-382
Publication Date: 2025/10/28
Abstract:
The current paper explores the role that government policies have played in the development of agripreneurship by SMEs in Rivers state, Nigeria. The research uses three dimensions of policies: financial support, infrastructure and market access and capacity building and regulatory frameworks; it adopts quantitative approach through administration of questionnaires to 294 agripreneurs. Findings indicate high positive correlation relationships exist between any variety of policies and agripreneurship growth with capacity-building and regulatory policies appearing the most significant (r = 0.429, p = 0.002), followed by financial support (r = 0.354, p = 0.002) and infrastructure/market access policies (r = 0.286, p = 0.001). Nevertheless, it was found that policymakers have not been able to close the gap completely especially when it comes to financial inclusion and gender equity as only 35 percent have access to formal credit and the female is struggling to keep pace with the male. The research highlights the importance of coordinated, technology-based policies that will help to maximize on the development of agripreneurship. Some of the important suggestions are the adoption of a digital lending platform to make it easier to borrow by the farmers, building of cold storage facilities with partnerships with the government, and decentralized process of business registration. The results can be used in the debate about effective agricultural policy in the developing economy and provide policymakers with actionable information that can benefit the expansion of SMEs through specific intervention.