ECONOMICS OF FISH MARKETING IN AKWA IBOM STATE, NIGERIA

The study investigated the economics of fish marketing in Akwa Ibom State, Nigeria using primary data. Purposive and multistage random sampling technique was used to collect the data from 105 respondents using well-structured and pre-tested questionnaire. These data were analysed using descriptive statistics, concentration ratio, price spread, net profit margins, marketing margins analyses and multinomial logit (MNL) models. Tests of significant differences and effects were carried out using analysis of variance (ANOVA) and t-test techniques. Research results showed that average age for the fish marketers were 38years for producers, 42years for wholesalers and 46years for retailers, and also that majority of them were married. The results further showed that majority of the fish producers and retailers had West African Senior School Certificate while most wholesalers had First School Leaving Certificate. Also, the all marketers had average household size of 5 members with 18years marketing experience for the producers, and 15years for the wholesalers and retailers, respectively. Furthermore, the study found that the marketers made use of referrals, price discount and home delivery to attract customers. The results showed that the market was under weak oligopoly at concentration ratio of 47%. This implies that the activities of the largest four fish marketers affected the price and demand for fish in the market. Further results showed that fish marketing was profitable with channel 2 having the highest net margin of N141,095 per annum per processing firm compared to channel 1 (N127,850) and channel 3 (N137,030) while channel 1 had the highest marketing efficiency of 342% relative to channels 2 and 3 with marketing efficiencies of 144% and 97%, respectively. The results indicated that these differences in marketing efficiency among the channels were significant at P