Abstract
The study examined home gardening practices, benefits, and constraints among lecturers in Akwa Ibom State University, Nigeria. A two-stage sampling technique was used to select 131 respondents, and data were collected using a structured questionnaire. Descriptive and inferential statistics were employed for data analysis. The results revealed that the majority of lecturers were males (53.4%) with a mean age of 43 years. Most respondents (82.4%) were married, with a mean household size of eight (8). A large proportion of the lecturers (60.3%) possessed PhD degrees as their highest educational qualification, had a mean home gardening experience of 8 years, and resided in their own homes. The mean income of lecturers was ₦250,500.00. Furthermore, the study revealed that most lecturers engaged other household members in home gardening activities and owned gardens mainly for food-related rather than non-food-related benefits. Physical, temporal, social, psychological, and environmental constraints ranked highest (>99%), followed by resource-related and technical constraints (>90%), while human capacity constraints ranked high (>80%). Results from the tested hypothesis using multivariate analysis of variance showed that income was the only socioeconomic variable that significantly influenced lecturers’ physical engagement in home gardening. The study concludes that while lecturers largely recognize the nutritional benefits of home gardening, other associated benefits remain less emphasized. It is therefore recommended that targeted educational awareness programmes, collaborations, and strategies be developed by relevant departments in the Faculties of Agriculture and Education to support and promote home gardening among lecturers, thereby improving professional productivity and enhancing environmental and economic outcomes.