Agricultural Administration and Extension最新文献

Coconut is an important crop in the Sri Lanka economy, in part due to the fact that nearly 20 per cent of the country's cultivated land is planted with this crop. Yet, the coconut sub-sector's contribution to the economy has not been satisfactory. Recognizing this, successive governments have introduced several measures to assist its development. The provision of extension services through a regional office network is one such measure. Although this traditional prescription has a role to play in the development process of the coconut sub-sector a wide range of factors, some internal and some external to the extension service system, appear to limit the effectiveness of the system. Among the internal factors, assignment of high priority non-extension duties to the extension personnel and mono-crop orientation of the system are significant while, of the external factors, peculiar characteristics of the coconut palm itself, lack of high-yielding varieties in adequate quantities and macro-economic policies which tend to depress the producer prices appear to be significant.

The need to develop an effective strategy of technology transfer to peasants has been increasingly emphasized due to the fact that access to and use of appropriate technology is seen as one of the important factors in increasing food production among the peasants of the Third World. This paper describes the use of Indigenous Specialists as agents of technology transfer by the International Institute of Rural Reconstruction in the Philippines (IIRR). The lessons generated from this experience are discussed to point out the implications for technology transfer strategies.

A model is designed to determine the conditions under which producers would adopt a cereal that fixes nitrogen. Applying the model to the US case, it appears that genetically engineering a nitrogen-fixing rice plant would probably divert too much energy from other yield-increasing mechanisms to be economically attractive. A plausible second-best case for public investment in biological technologies can be supported, however. Because biological nitrogen fixation is a land-using technology, subsidising its use reduces the need for costly set-aside programmes to maintain farm incomes.

After more than a decade of project work on Farming Systems Research, much confusion and disagreement surrounds the methodology for on-farm experiments. This paper reports the results of a survey of 41 practitioners who were asked to report on the methods and procedures they were using in their projects, and the reasons for success or failure. Responses suggest that projects based on formal, complex, researcher-designed experiments ran into a maze of problems including logistical support, analytical needs, interdisciplinary compromise, and farmer participation. Most importantly, this conventional approach to farming systems research fails to incorporate the experimential knowledge of the farmer in the research design. Thus, many if not most farming systems research projects fail to provide useful information to farmers or to station-based researchers. On the other hand, those practitioners who do report success indicate that experiments which exploit indigenous knowledge to define research questions, and employ many farmers to conduct simple, flexible trials can provide the information needed to develop technologies relevant to resource-poor farmers.

Development projects focused on the small farmer do not appear to be operating effectively in most places. Expressing its concern at the poor performance of agricultural and rural development administration, especially at the field level, the World Conference on Agrarian Reform and Rural Development (WCARRD), organised by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) in Rome in July 1979, recommended major adaptations in the institutions of governmental decision-making and implementation so that these acquire a capability to secure involvement of small farmers in programmes desitned to promote their development. In a series of regional expert consultations on Improving the Organization and Administration of Agricultural Development held subsequently, participants unequivocally underlined the need for the development of a cadre of administrators trained to cope with the emerging problems of agricultural development, especially those of the small farm sector. Taking into consideration the consensus that the agricultural development process has grown highly complex and that those responsible for administration need to have a better understanding of their challenging tasks. FAO has attempted to develop a programme for the training of agricultural administrators. The broad features of this innovative programme, and the methodology of putting it into operation involving the training of trainers as a very first step, are highlighted in this paper.

Systems analysis and simulation have developed into advanced tools in agriculture. They are used in research, extension and education. The recent availability of powerful inexpensive microcomputers now allows the use of these techniques in developing countries. A training programme was developed and conducted to enable the implementation of systems analysis and simulation in several national research institutes in South and Southeast Asia. Eight teams of four researchers from different disciplines participated in the training programme, which included a case study, involving both experimentation and computer simulation at their home institutes.

The evaluation indicated that this approach to training was effective. It is expected to be applicable on a wider scale. The interactions between team members from different disciplines were strengthened by the course experiences. Simulation provided a means and a reason for communication. However, reaching the ultimate goal of systems analysis and modelling at these national research institutes, i.e. to use these tools to contribute toward increased national agricultural production, is expected to require several years.

From colonial times to independence, Marketing Boards were established primarily for marketing exportable agricultural commodities produced in Nigeria on behalf of the producers. This role, though greatly mutilated by government in search of other interests, was expanded in the 1970s to take care of non-export agricultural commodities. In less than a decade after this expansion, the Boards are being completely scrapped to pave way for the ‘free play’ of market forces in the marketing of agricultural commodities both internally and externally.

The focus of this paper is to examine' the problems and prospects of agricultural marketing in Nigeria in the absence of the institutional arrangement provided by the Marketing Boards. A critical examination of the Export Promotion Council will be made in respect of export crops. A critical analysis of the marketing of crops for domestic use will also be undertaken. The policy implications arising from the analysis will be presented.

Accessibility to, and the efficient use of, the limited water supplies in the drought-prone and semi-arid areas of tropical Nigeria is a sine qua non for increasing agricultural productivity. Yet available evidence indicates that the majority of the farming population has not benefited from the development of supplementary water sources for irrigation. This study was, therefore, conducted in order to ascertain the degree of accessibility of smallholders and their families to a supplementary water supply for irrigation in Bauchi Local Government Area. Furthermore, a comparative analysis of the crop yields of farmers who applied irrigation versus those who did not apply any form of irrigation for the cultivation of their major staple food crops was conducted in order to determine the efficiency of use of the available water for increasing output.

In general, the degree of accessibility of small farmers to supplementary water sources for irrigation is remarkably low, with less than 10 per cent of the sampled population having access to, and, therefore, utilizing, supplemental water supply for cropping. However, even though the farmers who applied irrigation realized consistently higher yields than those who did not irrigate their crops, the yield differences were not statistically significant at the 5 per cent level. Reasons for the relatively low yield response have been elucidated.