10 pages., Article #:4FEA4, via online journal., Childhood obesity is one of the leading problems facing Americans today. As children continue to struggle with both obesity and food insecurity, many parents and doctors look to schools to be responsible for providing healthful meals. The aim of the Farm to School (F2S) program is to bring fresh, local produce into school cafeterias. Aligning with Extension goals, the F2S program provides an opportunity for both the development of healthful lifestyles and increases in agricultural profits. Through interviews with producers and school food service directors, we determined ways Extension programming can be used to improve the efficiency of the F2S program.
Ochilo, Willis N. (author), Ruffhead, Holly (author), Rumsey, Abigail (author), Chege, Florence (author), Lusweti, Charles (author), Oronje, Mary Lucy (author), and Otieno, Washington (author)
Format:
Online journal article
Publication Date:
2019
Published:
Taylor & Francis
Location:
Agricultural Communications Documentation Center, Funk Library, University of Illinois Box: 77 Document Number: D10807
18 pages., via online journal., Mobile apps are increasingly being used to answer development challenges around the world. The development opportunities that apps offer is wide-reaching but uptake of the technology varies. This article examines the ease of use and factors impacting user acceptance and behavior when interacting with an app for agricultural extension in Kenya. Results show factors including gender and age play a role in the adoption of technology by agricultural extension agents. The findings have useful lessons for apps’ development in the agricultural sector and suggest that including intended users of an app in the design process significantly increases usability.
8 pages., via online journal., Land degradation and soil nutrient depletion have become serious threats to agricultural productivity in sub- Saharan Africa. To improve agriculture production, research has led to recommendation of a range of integrated Soil fertility Management (ISFM) options, of proven effectiveness, for soil fertility improvement. Although many factors contribute to the low adoption of ISFM by farmers, communication gaps between extension agents and farmers lie at the heart of the problem. Hence, the study sought to investigate factors considered by agricultural extension agents in selection of communication channels to disseminate soil fertility information in the central highlands of Kenya. Structured questionnaires were used to elicit information from 105 extension agents. Both descriptive and inferential statistics were used for data analysis. In choosing the communication method to be used in dissemination of soil fertility management (SFM) practices, target group was scored as the most relevant factor followed by type of SFM, time available then number of staff sequentially. Education was perceived to highly influence the selection of workshop (M= 3.4) while age was perceived to highly influence the selection of video showing (M= 2.8) as extension methods in dissemination of SFM. The implication of the study is that diverse communication channels should be utilized to get to farmers of different socio economic characteristics.
14 pages., via online journal., Parks and protected areas can be ideal settings for climate change communication since many visitors have an affinity for natural and cultural settings, and an interest in resource protection. However, climate-based education efforts in the Midwestern United States may need a slightly different approach since this region lacks obvious indicators, such as sea level rise and melting glaciers. Interpretation, an informal communication process designed to transmit scientific information to visitors in leisure-based settings, could be a useful strategy for engaging visitors in climate change discussions. Few studies have assessed perceptions of interpreters on this topic, much less, their willingness to communicate such information. To address this issue, a mixed methods approach (surveys, interviews, photovoice) was used to examine interpreters’ perceptions of climate change and its impacts in Missouri State Park and Historic Sites. Although nearly 70% of interpreters were either alarmed or concerned about climate change, many of them were unsure about its causation. Interpreters report observing impacts such as flooding, earlier plant blooming, high temperatures, extreme weather, and invasive species, but were uncertain about attributing these impacts to climate change. Interpreters did not believe that visitors would be responsive to climate-based education per se but thought the topic could be addressed in pre-existing programs and activities. Rather than discussing complex science with visitors, interpreters felt more comfortable with conveying the significance of resources at their sites. Implications from this study include acknowledging multiple viewpoints, framing strategic messages, and developing place-based educational materials.
13 pages., Article #:v58-1a2, via online journal., According to the 2018 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, without urgent global changes, climate catastrophe caused by warming of greater than 1.5°C will occur by 2030, endangering the planet's capacity to sustain human populations and livelihoods. The National Network for Sustainable Living Education administered a national survey in January 2017 to assess how well-positioned Extension is to address sustainability in the communities the organization serves. Educators from 40 states responded, and 1,395 usable surveys were received. Survey results will help Extension employees discover opportunities for innovation and relevancy in their programming.
7 pages., Article #:3RIB1, via online journal., As online communication becomes more important to Extension professionals, understanding how promotional strategies affect the number of people accessing online content also becomes more important. We tracked website visits resulting from four different promotional efforts to understand relative effectiveness of these efforts. Each effort was unique in cost, efficacy, and efficiency. We found that using multiple promotional approaches to drive traffic to educational content can increase engagement over time and allow for reaching larger audiences.
13 pages., via online journal., This study examined the feasibility of the use of mobile phones as an educational tool in agricultural extension services in the Guilan Province of Iran. A descriptive-survey methodology was employed on a sample population of 120 agricultural extension agents. Data were analyzed at descriptive and inferential levels using SPSS Statistics for Windows, Version 20 (IBM Corp., Armonk, NY, USA). The results of the factor analysis indicated that the application of mobile phones in extension activities was influenced by three factors: economic, skill, and infrastructure. These factors accounted for 52.3% of the variance. Moreover, the possibility for the development of mobile phones as an educational medium is impacted by social, financial-credit, information-communicational, psychological, and improper conditions factors that, in total, captured 70.4% of the variance.
19 pages., via online journal., This article discusses how to involve rural youths not in employment, education, or training (or NEETs) in agriculture. A Portuguese network-based project called Terra Nostra, carried out
from 2013 to 2015 to engage and train NEETs in ecoagriculture activities, was examined to address this issue. The study focused on three aspects: a reanalysis of Terra Nostra’s final report, based
on the bioecological model, targeting typical problems with NEETs’ involvement and how the project aimed to overcome them; the lessons learned from the project according to the literature; and the state of the art regarding identical social interventions with NEETs in Portugal and the rest of Europe. A major conclusion stemming from the analysis is that similar projects
will need to address the limitations of employment public services in reaching out to rural NEETs and the state’s excessive protectionism of the sector.
10 pages., via online journal., Peri-urban environments, where agriculture and urbanization interact, pose unique challenges for soil management. In Miami-Dade County, Florida USA, this interaction is especially important; a population of 2.7 million lives in an urban county with only 6% of the area zoned agriculture. Miami-Dade County is a major producer of tropical fruit and winter vegetables for the U.S., and is located within the Everglades ecosystem. Relatively little information is known about research and extension within peri-urban environments concerning soil health and management. Ethnopedological work has contributed to ethno-scientific knowledge by bridging the communication gap between scientists and locals concerning soil taxonomies, soil health, and soil fertility management. This study explores mental models of farmers and experts, examining the communication gap concerning soil health and food security. Semi-structured interviews were used to collect data from farmers (n = 19) and experts (n = 13). All stakeholders perceived pressures from urbanization as the main barrier to farmers' ability to continue to produce food, maintain their soil health, and contribute to national food security. The mental models of farmers reveal their ability to continue farming depends on their ability to construct and sustain a system—the soil food value chain. In this system, the farmer generates farm capital from a combination of high quality products, lower quality produce, and culls. This farm capital includes value-added products or soil amendments. However, experts did not perceive their responsibility to include maintaining a system, rather, only improving production. Experts' research and extension focused on improving product quality, increasing yield, decreasing cost of production, and minimizing the environmental impact of production. The mental models of farmers suggest research and extension related to building and maintaining the entire soil food value chain would increase the likelihood the farmers would better care for their soil and be profitable. This research contributes to the literature by recognizing the importance of examining the barriers to soil communication between stakeholders, as well as the importance to include examining soil within the larger food system.
12 pages., via online journal., Development of extension and outreach that effectively engage farmers in climate
change adaptation and/or mitigation activities can be informed by an improved understanding of farmers’ perspectives on climate change and related impacts. This research employed
latent class analysis (LCA) to analyze data from a survey of 4,778 farmers from 11 US Corn
Belt states. The research focused on two related research questions: (1) to what degree do
farmers differ on key measures of beliefs about climate change, experience with extreme
weather, perceived risks to agriculture, efficacy, and level of support for public and private adaptive and mitigative action; and (2) are there potential areas of common ground
among farmers? Results indicate that farmers have highly heterogeneous perspectives, and
six distinct classes of farmers are identified. We label these as the following: the concerned
(14%), the uneasy (25%), the uncertain (25%), the unconcerned (13%), the confident (18%),
and the detached (5%). These groups of farmers differ primarily in terms of beliefs about
climate change, the degree to which they had experienced extreme weather, and risk perceptions. Despite substantial differences on these variables, areas of similarity were discerned
on variables measuring farmers’ (1) confidence that they will be able to deal with increases
in weather variability and (2) support for public and private efforts to help farmers adapt to
increased weather variability. These results can inform segmented approaches to outreach that
target subpopulations of farmers as well as broader engagement strategies that would reach
wider populations. Further, findings suggest that strategies with specific reference to climate
change might be most effective in engaging the subpopulations of farmers who believe that
climate change is occurring and a threat, but that use of less charged terms such as weather
variability would likely be more effective with a broader range of farmers. Outreach efforts
that (1) appeal to farmers’ problem solving capacity and (2) employ terms such as “weather
variability” instead of more charged terms such as “climate change” are more likely to be
effective with a wider farmer audience.
