The paper investigated how agro-allied programmes and economic development are managed in Akwa Ibom State, Nigeria. It explored the implications of three agro-allied programmes – coordination of farmers loan scheme; organizing of poultry and fish production scheme; and monitoring of fertilizer distribution scheme – on the economic development of the state, using dimensions of Gross Domestic Product (GDP), unemployment rate, and poverty rate. The paper adopted ex-post facto design using multiple regression models for testing the hypotheses formulated to determine the cause and effect relationship between the independent and dependent variables with the aid of Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS) software version 20. It relied largely on secondary data extracted and compiled from the budget estimate on agro-allied programmes in Akwa Ibom State. Findings from the study revealed that coordination of farmers’ loan scheme, organizing of poultry and fish production scheme and monitoring of fertilizer distribution scheme have significant positive effect on gross domestic product as well as unemployment rate in Akwa Ibom State. Thus, it was recommended that management of Akwa Ibom Agricultural Development Programme should ensure proper planning and coordination of farmers’ loan scheme such that the loans get to the farmers; increase capacity building of farmers to ensure efficient utilization of the loans on agro-allied businesses necessary for economic development; and put in place appropriate monitoring mechanism to check corrupt practices in the fertilizer distribution scheme to ensure that fertilizers get to the farmers before planting season.
Keywords: : management; agro-allied programmes; economic development
