Farm Land Disputes and Food Security in Nasarawa State

This study examines the effects of farm land disputes in terms of selling family land without permission dispute, land owners and squatters’ dispute and dispute relating to gifting on food security in Nasarawa State. Survey design is used given the population of the study that is relatively large. The population of the study comprises of all the adults within eighteen (18) years and above, male and female in Nasarawa State. A stratified sampling method is used to select one local government area from each o f the three senatorial zones that made up the state. Furthermore, a judgmental sampling technique is used to select local government from each of these zones with the highest agricultural produce. Then, a convenient sampling method is used to select fifty (50) respondents from each of the three local government selected from each of the three senatorial zones in the state. Thus, these local governments are selected from each of these zones. Nasarawa South (Awe), Nasarawa North (Nasarawa Eggon), and Nasarawa West (Toto). This makes a total of one hundred and fifty (150) respondents selected for the study. Ordinary Least Squares Method of Regression (OLS) is used and found out that, land owners and squatters’ dispute and dispute relating to gifting are significant negatively related to food security in Nasarawa State. However, insignificant negative effect of selling family land without permission dispute on food security is found. It is recommended among others that, Nasarawa State Government should pay attent ion in resolving farm land disputes in the state by partnering with traditional rulers.