The comparative assessment of Livelihood activities of fisherfolk at Geriyo and Rugange Lakes, Adamawa, Nigeria using structure questionnaires. The alternative livelihood activities engaged on by fishers in Geriyo and Rugange are farming, animal rearing, civil service, trading, poultry keeping and selling of vegetables. Apart from farming that ranked first at the two communities, other activities ranked differently. The fishers at Geriyo all claimed that money used in staring and running their fisheries business and other livelihood activities were from personal savings; although the fishers at Rugange attested to personal savings, cooperative society, help from friend and others sources as means of funding the business. Based on this study, there is need for proper management strategies to be put in place to ensure sustainability of the two water bodies.

The management of inland water bodies and conservation of fisheries resources in Nigeria has been principally in the traditional domain, where traditional strategies such as water tenure, taboos, ritual prohibitions, magic, closed seasons, gear restrictions and flood plain intensification are employed. Some of these traditional strategies are inadvertent or unintentional in that, they were initially put in place for reasons other than the management and conservation of the local fisheries, while others were termed intentional because they were designed to protect, conserve and increase some specific fisheries for particular events or reasons (Odusanya, 2008). However, Ladu et al. (2013) and Panda (2021) also observed some unintentional traditional strategies in Sokoto and Kano States in northern Nigeria, where seasonal rivers and flood ponds are closed for fishing in the rainy season principally to protect the interest of the full-time farmer, who returns to part-time fishing in the dry season, rather than the protection of the fisheries. Since diversification often involves a change in income portfolio either by adding the portfolios or by expanding the existing ones. Although, the rural fishing economy is a complex one with various activities, however the majority of the fisher’s diversity more in fishing, crop production, livestock, trading and other services Sogbesan and Baka (2017). The livelihoods approach seeks to improve rural development policy and practice by recognising the seasonal and cyclical complexity of livelihood strategies, helping to remove access constraints to assets and activities that complement existing patterns, and identifying ways of making livelihoods as a whole more able to cope with adverse trends or sudden shocks. A fundamental precept of the approach is that it seeks ‘‘to identify what the poor have rather than what they do not have’’ and ‘‘[to] strengthen people’s own inventive solutions, rather than substitute for, block or undermine them’ (Allinson and Ellis, 2001). The impact of livelihood diversifications among artisanal fisher folks is exhaustive, complex and sometimes it is debatable. On one hand, researchers like Bernard et al. (2014), Nse-Nelson et al. (2016) argue that non-farm diversification opportunities may take able farm labours from the agriculture sector and that eventually may cause a decline in farm productivity. FAO/World Bank farming system study noted the importance of five major household strategies for escaping poverty for 70 farming systems across the world: intensification, diversification, and increased asset base, increase off-farm income, and exist from agriculture. Diversification, which includes fisheries, was adjudged to be the single most promising source of farm poverty reducing in this millennium (Dixon et al., 2000). The current trend of increased production can be maintained either through intensification or expansion of area under aquaculture production.

Study Areas
The study area is Lake Geriyo and Lake Rugange located besides the dual city of Jimeta and Yola respectively, the capital city of Adamawa state, in the Semi-Arid, dry lands climate of north-eastern Nigeria. The Land mass of the two urban centers is 111.85 km² Jimeta and 719.0 km² Yola, having a total of 830.85 km² and their populations are 199,674 and 196,197 people for Jimeta and Yola respectively (Tukur and Barde, 2014). The area is geographically located between Longitudes 12° 20' E and 12° 30' and Latitude 9° 06' N and 9° 19' N along the bank’s of River Benue. Lake Geriyo is located at latitude 9°18’29’’N and longitude 12°26’55’’E and Lake Rugange is located at latitude 9°06’31’’N and longitude 120 30’20’’E. The altitude of the basin area varies from 145 to 149 m above mean sea level (Barde et al., 2019). The two lakes are important sources of water for drinking, irrigation, recreational, and cultural uses.

Population and sampling techniques
The population for this study comprise of Geriyo and Rugange Reservoirs. The major targets were the fishers where twenty were sampled from each of the communities. A total of Forty (40) fishers were sampled using simple random sampling method for administration of questionnaires.

Demographic Profile and Livelihood Assessment
The demographic profile, socio-economic livelihood of the fishers and their other livelihoods diversity was conducted using semi-structured questionnaire to get information regarding fisheries enterprises profitability, women involvement in fisheries, Alternative/diversified livelihood means, Financial linkages/Financial Institution linkages. The issue of vulnerability to poverty by the fishing community needed to be documented for the two communities. Tafida et al. (2011) as modified by Ovie and Tafida (2013) and Sogbesan (2014) were adopted for wealth ranking using Participatory Rapid Approach method

Statistical analysis
Data analysis: The data collected were analyzed using T-test to correlates, the fish catch, Socio-economic activities of the fishers, Fish species found in the lake, threatened fish species and other contributing livelihoods activities in the fishing villages. Graph was used to represent some of the data collected. The economic status of each fisher was determined by calculating the weight in kilogram(s) of fish X N2,300.00, this was also used to evaluate the impact of fishing on the income of fishers and the population of the fishing community. T-test as used to compare the variations in fish diversity of the two water bodies.

The age, gender, educational status marital status, language spoken, family size, fishing experience are presented for Geriyo and Rugange on Table 1. Table 2 showed the different types of fisheries livelihood activities engaged in with the materials and equipment used by the fisheries. On the table, there is price of the equipment and mean cost was provided to compared prices at the two communities. Despite the fact that they are located in the same Adamawa, some of the prices are significantly higher for the same activity.

Alternative Livelihood and their Ranking at Geriyo and Rugange
The alternative livelihood activities engaged on by fishers in Geriyo and Rugange are farming, animal rearing, civil service, trading, poultry keeping and selling of vegetables as showed in Figure 1. The table 3 showed the ranking of the alternative livelihood by the fishers at Geriyo and Rugange based on economic importance, profit and population involvement. In Geriyo, five livelihoods were ranked while in Rugange, six livelihood activities were ranked. Apart from farming that ranked first at the two communities, other activities ranked differently. The fishers at Geriyo all claimed that money used in staring and running their fisheries business and other livelihood activities were from personal savings; although the fishers at Rugange attested to personal savings, cooperative society, help from friend and others sources as means of funding the business (Figure 2).

The 100% of the respondents from Geriyo were not member of Cooperative society while 10% from Rugange were members of cooperative society. The name of the cooperative society is Rugange Women Cooperative society, it is a registered cooperative society with 45 members and the respondents had joined for the past 5 years and had also benefited assistance for their livelihood. The table 4 contained information on the economic activities of the fishers at both geriyo and rugange fishing communities. The market linkages of the fishers at Geriyo and Rugange as shown on Table 5 indicated that fish are sold by the fishermen at the landing sites while some of the marketers take them also to the market as wholesalers and sell to retailers. The customers are fish processors, fish sellers, restaurant to mention a few.

In some small fishing communities livelihoods has been at subsistence level just to feed the family and at time little for sell, when the need arises in some places while the fishing communities at Geriyo and Rugange where fishing is done at a large scale artisanal level has suffered neglect in terms of development over the years as in comparison with other agricultural sector (Neiland et al., 2002; David et al., 2011). Those fishing areas were isolated and their community member depend on the natural resources (fishery), but its fast depleting due to poor management and over exploitation. This decrease in resource availability does not only resulted in poor income, but also well-being of fishing households. Where this is prominent livelihood diversification has been identified as a good option that lessens vulnerability, enhance well-being and improve rural economy (Petrere and Ribeiro 1994, Petrere 1996, Ovie and Belal, 2011) since fishing communities in Nigeria are generally still far from developed and the (fishers) are categorized among the poorest of the poor (Araoye, 2002; Williams, 2007). This important sector is faced with the challenges of dwelling resources over the years, following exploitation and lack of sustainable management leading to poor socio-economic well-being of the fishers.

The itemized challenges and solutions are shown on Table 6. All the respondents agreed that women do participate in Fisheries from both Geriyo and Rugange. Women participate in processing (smoking /Frying/salting/drying), and selling (Fresh/Smoked). Alternative livelihood strategies enable fishers’ households to become involved in different economic sectors, thus cushioning the effects of variations in fisheries’ resources Charles, 2011). Involvement in alternative livelihood strategies seemed to be the way forward for the Lake Rugange and Geriyo fishers since fishing income was no longer dependable. However, support from the fishery’s stakeholders towards such strategies was needed. As such, there is a need for fishers to develop stronger collaborations with other stakeholders in order to attract their expertise and resources and help boost alternative income sources as was demonstrated by small-scale fishers and the government (Donda, 2017).

Recommendation
Funding is essential in the development of the alternative livelihood, so investors and agricultural bank can see this as an opportunity in giving grants to the fishers and creating perfect market linkages will be an encouraging factor to fishers

Conflict of Interest
There is no conflict of interest between the authors. All authors contributed to the field and manuscript writing