DETERMINANTS OF AGRICULTURAL LAND EXPANSION IN NIGERIA: APPLICATION OF ERROR CORRECTION MODELING (ECM)

Sa？etak This study used an ECM to analyze the determinants of agricultural land expansion in Nigeria. Results show that at first differencing, Augmented Dickey Fuller test indicated stationarity for all the variables (p< 0.05) and there were 7 cointegrating vectors using Johansen test. The dynamic unrestricted short-run parameters of permanent cropland growth rates (68.62), agricultural production index (10.23), livestock population (0.003), human population (-0.145), other land (-0.265) and cereal cropland growth rate (0.621) have significant impact on agricultural land expansion (p< 0.05). The study recommended that appropriate policies to address the problem of expansion of agricultural land and agricultural production must focus on development of cereal and permanent crop hybrids that are high yielding and resistant to environmental stress, human population control and guided use of land for industrial and urban development, among others