Impact of socio-economic factors on members’ sales volume to cooperative societies: The case of selected districts of Southwest Shewa Zone, Oromia National Regional State, Ethiopia

Abstract

Multipurpose Agricultural cooperatives are believed to play a crucial role in curbing the lack of modern inputs and access to markets by providing services ranging from making credit and modern inputs available to creating market opportunities and selling members’ output. This study aimed to identify demographic, social and economic factors that affect members' Sales Volume in Multipurpose Agricultural Cooperative Societies. This research was conducted in two selected Districts of the Southwest Shewa Zone of Oromia National Regional State to identify the Impact of socioeconomic Factors on Members' Sales Volume in Multipurpose Agricultural Cooperative Societies: In Some Selected Districts of the Southwest Shewa Zone. The main participants/target populations of the study were Members of Multipurpose Agricultural Cooperative Societies found in Bacho and Waliso districts. For the sake of achieving the objectives of this study, different-stage sampling procedures were followed to select four Multipurpose Cooperative Societies and a total of three hundred fifty-one (351) respondents. A random sampling technique has been used to select a sample of respondents. A multiple linear regression model and descriptive statistics were used to analyze the data. The result of this study indicated that the sales volume of members of Multipurpose Cooperative Societies was significantly influenced by educational level, family size, duration of membership, household land size, agricultural inputs credit and production capacity. Therefore, the study recommended that cooperatives should not set the purchase prices below the market prices, they should try to follow the market price every time and create awareness for members about engagement in other agricultural activities and the advantages of selling their products to cooperatives.