An agro-economic characterizaton of the Niger household : case of Tahoua

Since the big drought of 1984, the department of Tahoua in the Republic of Niger is very vulnerable to structural and temporal disruptions. The food vulnerability is defined as “the analysis of coping strategies and reactions faced with the structural or/and temporary shocks, if the coping strategies are not effectives, the people are in a temporary or structural situation of food vulnerability” (Andres and Lebailly, 2011a; Andres, 2012). The environment is much degraded by the wind and water erosion. Despite many opportunities to develop the rural sector, the region of Tahoua has a structural problem because the income is not very high and the major part of the population is poor. This paper analyzes the characteristics of households in function of the food system. The target is to classify the population in relation to the food agricultural systems. A global description is defined and characterized for the agricultural system. The paper is based on a survey realized during 2010 and 2011. The investigators have interviewed 420 heads of household. The results are analyzed by Excel and SPSS software. The statistical analysis is a comparison of averages and the descriptive statistics. The results show a difference between the north (pastoral) and the south (agricultural) of the region of Tahoua, especially, for the production of cowpea, the number of tropical livestock units, the number of fields. Furthermore, the systemic view is very important to identify the specific constraints and opportunities of each food system.