ABSTRACT
Branding strategies have become an accepted part of marketing activity and it is the norm
for manufactured and processed food products to be offered to consumers as branded
products. However, as any vigilant consumer would have noticed, there is still a wide
range of agricultural products that remains unbranded. Agricultural and horticultural
products are often relatively unprocessed and do not have clear brands associated with
particular suppliers. It has become common to find generic brand associated with groups
of suppliers, or are merely used as labels to identify particular attributes of the products.
In attempting to explore such issues it is often assumed that the lack of such activity is a
result of the small firms that exist in the industry, or simply because of the lack of
marketing knowledge amongst producers. Farmers have normally sold their products as
commodities. This means that there is no appreciable difference between the produce of a
farmer and that of another farmer. Nigeria’s agricultural marketing competitiveness has
been bedevilled by a lot of market related factors that has to do with the absence of
standardization of products in the market place. Standardized system of grading and
measurement, which enhances marketing efficiency, is not a feature of agricultural
markets in Nigeria. Grades are determined arbitrarily by sizes, colour or smell.
Measures come in various types of metal and plastic bowls, dishes, tins, baskets and
calabashes.
Most of the measures are susceptible to manipulation to change volume, in an
attempt to take advantage of buyers. In addition, sorting, branding and packaging
activities which are not carried out further reduces the ability of using a sound marketing
system to boost farmers’ income and ensure adequate protection of consumers in the
country. The study would therefore address the importance of branding as a strategy for
effective agricultural marketing in Nigeria and its ability to make agricultural marketing
more effective and competitive.
