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The goal of this study was to determine the impact of access to credit facilities on financial performance among farmers of cooperative societies. The study also tested the predictive power of financial literacy.

The descriptive survey research design was used for the study while the sample size was 240 farmers of cooperative societies from South-East Nigeria. The farmers were categorised into those with access to credit facilities and those without access to credit facilities. A structured questionnaire was used to collect data for the study. Data were analysed using multiple analyses of variance (MANOVA) and multiple regression analysis.

Farmers with access to credit facilities reported higher financial performance such as return on investment, working capital, net profit, profit margin and sales. However, those without access to credit facilities reported lower mean scores on financial performance. Also, financial literacy, like financial knowledge, attitude and awareness, significantly predicts the impact of access to credit facilities on financial performance. It was also found that the duration of repayment of credit facilities, like medium and long term, contributes more to improving financial performance.

This study has shown that even though access to credit facilities impacts financial performance, financial literacy is an important consideration. Also, the duration of repayment is a crucial factor.

This study aimed to develop and test the impact of a social media-based intervention for improving the business skills and income of young smallholder farmers.

First, the researchers used an exploratory approach to develop a social media-based intervention for acquiring business skills and improving income. Second, the researchers tested the effectiveness of the developed programme on a sample of 506 young smallholder farmers. Finally, the intervention and data collection took place over five years (2017–2021).

The result showed steady improvements in business skills and income from 2017 to 2021 for the treatment group, unlike the control group. Also, improvements in business skills led to a reduction in expenses and an increase in profit from 2017 to 2021. A further evaluation of the result showed that an addition of 5.1 mean scores in business skills led to the addition of $91 income between 2017 and 2018; for 2018–2019, 2.6 improvements in business skills increased income by $123. For 2019–2020, a 2.7 improvement increased income by $209, whilst for 2020–2021, a 1.6 improvement increased income by $320.

The results of this study could help explore ways of using social media to change behaviour aimed at improving income amongst young smallholder farmers.