Abstract
Unemployment and poverty are major forerunners of underdevelopment in developing countries. The economic burden of unemployment and poverty on a country necessitates this study. The objectives of the study were to examine the dimension and linkage between agricultural growth and poverty and also unemployment and to evaluate the effect of poverty and unemployment on agricultural production in Nigeria. Time series data were employed for the study from the year 1980-2012 which was sourced from central bank of Nigeria, annual abstract of statistics of the Nigeria federal office of statistics, Nigeria Bureau of Statistics and United Nations Publications. Granger causality and co-integration model were the analytical tools used. Some of the recommendations given are that agriculture in Nigeria should be given a top priority and that government bodies should encourage the poor farmers by absorbing the excess inventory of agricultural output in order to distribute it to the total populace and thus increase in agricultural production will create more employment and as a result alleviate poverty.
