Better integration of intra-regional fish trade into national policy agenda is reported as a tool for improving food and nutritional security; and poverty reduction in Africa. However, critical information on market structure of intra-regional fish trade needed to ensure food security in the West African corridor is very limited.This study investigated the market structure for fish trade along Nigeria-Cameroon-Chad border.Akwa Ibom, Cross River, Benue.Taraba.Adamawa and Borno States along the Nigeria-Cameroon-Chad border were purposively selected for this study. Snowball sampling procedure was employed for sample selection. Structured questionnaires were administered to producers (300), processors (300) and marketers (300). Data were analysed usingdescriptive statistics, budgetary analysis, Herfindahl index, Gini coefficient, and ANOVA at □ 0.05. The study revealed that the production node was dominated by males 93.3%, while the processing (55.0%) and marketing (56.0%) nodes were dominated by females. Majority of the producers (34.3%), processors (34.0%) and marketers (39.7%) were within the age bracket of 41-50 years and had secondary school education (31.7%, 40.7% and 43.7% respectively). Majority of the respondents had marketing experience averaging 15 years for producers, 13 years for processors and 8 years for marketers. The empirical findings on Gini coefficients for actors in fresh fish production node were (0.63,0.53) and marketing node (0.43,0.43); smoked fish processing node (0.68,) and marketing node (0.46, 0.39); dried fish processing node (0.69) and marketing node (0.51, 0.34) and frozen fish marketing node (0.36, 0.25) translating to imperfect competitive market structure. Herfindahl index was highest for fresh (0.72), smoked (0.80) and dried (0.99) fish markets in Borno, Cross River and Adamawa States, respectively and frozen (1.00) fish markets in Akwa Ibom, Cross River and Borno States. Processing node had the highest gross margin (□371,559.91 ±282965.56) and marketing margin (□405,394.09±392255.64), and marketing node had the highest marketing efficiency of 87.69±84.86. Fresh fish (564.13±552.27kg) was the highest volume of fish sold in intra-State marketing. The bulk of inter-State and intra-regional inflow and outflow trade came from the quantity of fresh (I, 250.64±703.53kg and I, 7l9.44±638.63kg, respectively) and dried (2,098.00±306.88kg and 2,205.11 ±987.43kg, respectively) fish products traded.The processing node is the most profitable and the marketing node is the most efficient of the fish marketing nodes identified. Hence, investment in the fish value chain should focus on enhancing the efficiency and the profitability of the weak nodes in the chain.
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