Factors Affecting the Attitudes of Members’ Towards Participation in Fisheries Cooperative In Dahlak Islands, Eritrea

Abstract

The study intended to analyze factors affecting the members’ attitudes towards
participation their cooperative in fishing communities of Dahlak Islands, Eritrea.
The Ministry of Marine Resources Eritrea (MMR) initiated the formation of
fisheries cooperatives in 1994, in 2017 only 39 village level cooperatives and 6
regional fishery cooperatives were functional. Considering the fact that active
participations leads to successful cooperation, yet only about 1,500 fishermen and
women were actively incorporated nationwide. Dahlak islands fisheries
cooperative was one of the six reginal cooperative with 228 active members
engaged in fish supply services. To understand their attitude, the study used
quantitative approach in collecting data, information was gathered using
questionnaires from 140 systematically selected random samples with 95%
confidence level. To obtain information Likert-type questions were designed,
where the data were considered as continuous data and analyzed using Statistical
Package for Social Sciences. The results showed that attitudes towards
participation were positive, with only 11.4% of the respondent having negative
attitudes. The attitudes of members were correlated with independent factors of
age, gender, educational level, monthly income, family size, profession, training
attendance, number of training taken, loan received and amount of loan received.
Sorted from highest to lowest the variables with significant correlation were;
number of training taken (0.50**), cooperative related training taken (0.46**),
monthly income from Cooperative (0.34**), loan received (0.25**) amount of loan
taken (0.20*). In conclusion taking training and number of training taken of
members were attributes to active psrticipation, and with the increase in number of
trainings the members had more positive attitudes towards participation. Moreover,
the chances of receiving loans and amount of loans had significant effect in
increasing participation. It is recommended to increase the number of training
given and accessibility of loans to improve participation of members in fisheries
cooperative in Dahlak islands, Eritrea.
Key Words: Dahlak, fishery, cooperative, participation, attitude