Residents' quality of life in Seme border settlements, Nigeria
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Date
2015
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife
Abstract
The study examined the socio-economic characteristics of residents in selected settlements of Seme border; identified and examined the available social, economic and environmental infrastructure; examined the determinants of residents’ QoL and examined the residents’ perceived Quality of Life (QoL) in the study area. This is with a view to suggesting policy measures to enhance residents' QoL in the border region.
Data for the study were obtained from both primary and secondary sources. Primary data were obtained from residents in the existing 21 settlements stratified into huts, hamlets and villages in the study area. One of every two settlements (50%) was randomly selected without replacement, giving a total of 11 settlements. There were 228, 1131 and 284 buildings in the selected huts, hamlets and villages respectively. Questionnaire were administered on household heads in every fifth (5th) building (20%) using systematic random sampling. Out of the 1643 buildings, 329 were sampled. Data collected included the residents’ socio-economic attributes, views on the availability and condition of infrastructure, QoL indicators and the determinants of QoL. Secondary data obtained included population figures and maps of the study area from Badagry Local Government. Data obtained were analyzed using frequency, ANOVA, Chi-square, and Factor analysis.
Findings revealed that 83.6% of the respondents were between the age bracket of 31 and 60 year. The mean age of residents was 44 years. The average monthly income of the residents in the study area was N22, 700.00k. There is a significant difference in the average monthly income of the residents in the hut, hamlet and villages with N25, 300.00k, N24, 600.00k and N12, 700.00k respectively (F= 2.733 and p=0.66). It was established that 64.4% of the residents' engaged in informal activities. Findings further revealed that all the respondents (100%) had access to communication facilities such as mobile phone and radio while most of the settlements had no access to government supplied electricity. The average condition of all facilities measured on 7-point Likert scale in the study area was slightly bad (2.93). The facility in the poorest condition was electricity supply with an index of very bad (1.07). Generally, the three most important QoL indicators to residents were the health of residents', access to local government waste disposal facilities and availability of electricity supply each with an index of 7.00. The satisfaction derived from the services related to the above indicators were with indices of 3.31, 1.00 and 2.98 respectively. The level of importance attached to QoL indicators directly varied with increase in settlement's size as the indices for the hut, hamlet and villages were 5.51, 5.64 and 5.66 respectively. The overall residents' perceived QoL for the study area was slightly poor (index = 3.15). Six determinants of QoL identified, jointly explained a variance of 68.7%. Three of these factors (infrastructure and governance, social connectedness and safety) explained variance of 22.2%, 14.8% and 13.6% respectively.
The study concluded that residents' level of satisfaction were very low with the indicators rated to be of very high in importance to their quality of life such as quality and reliability of government services, electricity availability among others. More so, the availability and quality of infrastructure that can positively impact on the residents’ QoL were very poor.
Description
xv,164p
Keywords
Quality of life, Residents' quality of life, Seme border settlements, Government services, Socio-economic, Nigeria
Citation
Oluwadare D B(2015). Residents' quality of life in Seme border settlements, Nigeria