Appraisal of the National Poverty Eradication Programme (NAPEP) in Jalingo Local Government Area, Taraba State, Nigeria

Abstract

The study appraised the impact of the National Poverty Eradication Programme (NAPEP) in Jalingo Local Government Area of Taraba State, Nigeria with a view to measure its success or failure since 1999 to date. Using stratified and random sampling technique, 100 respondents were selected from the Capacity Acquisition Programme (CAP) beneficiaries, 67 from the Mandatory Attachment Programme (MAP) beneficiaries and 399 non-benefiting respondents. A Focus Group Discussion (FGD) was also used to assess expert opinions on the impact of the programme. Questionnaires were administered to elucidate needed in. formation from all groups of respondents. The simple percentage score and student t-test were used for analysis. Results obtained shows that most beneficiaries of the programme fall within the age bracket of 15-30 years, while 40.4% of the non beneficiaries had no access to any formal education. Analysis of dependency ratio also shows that 32.1% of the non beneficiaries had between 7-9 dependants, while 42.5% of the benefiting respondents had between 4-6 dependants. A greater percentage (71.4%) attested to the fact that benefiting from the programme had a political angle to it. Responses on programme assessment were quite varied. The student t-test result reveals that there is strong positive relationship between in. come of beneficiaries before and after enrollment in. the programme. This relationship is significant at the 0.001% confidence level. The focused group discussion validates the research findings. Appropriate recommendations and suggestions were proffered. The research concludes that the programme needs to be re-designed in order to address some critical poverty sectors.