Bentley, Jeffery (author), Boa, Eric (author), and Salm, Mundie (author)
Format:
Report
Publication Date:
2016
Published:
International: Technical Centre for Agricultural and Rural Cooperation, ACP-EU, Wageningen, The Netherlands
Location:
Agricultural Communications Documentation Center, Funk Library, University of Illinois Box: 166 Document Number: D08500
Notes:
ACDC holds citation information, introduction, contents page and the first three stories., Features workshop organized by Access Agriculture, Nairobi. 56 pages.
Ragasa, Catherina (author), Ulimwengo, John (author), Randriamamonjy, Josee (author), Badibanga, Thaddee (author), and International Food Policy Research Institution
Washington, DC office
Western and Central Africa Regional Office
Format:
Online journal article
Publication Date:
2016-04
Published:
Netherlands: Taylor and Francis
Location:
Agricultural Communications Documentation Center, Funk Library, University of Illinois Box: 108 Document Number: D10953
32 pages, via online journal article, Purpose: As part of the institutional reforms and agricultural restructuring in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), this paper provides an assessment of the performance of the agricultural extension system as well as factors explaining it.
Method: This paper involves key informants’ interviews and surveys of 107 extension organizations and 162 extension agents in randomly selected 156 villages, analyzed using qualitative and logistic regression methods.
Findings and Practical Implications: Results show that despite having one of the highest extension agent-to-farmer ratio and a pluralistic extension system, DRC fails to deliver knowledge and technologies to rural areas due to lack of coordination, no unified and clear policy and mandate, lack of funding, aging and low competencies of agents, and lack of mobility and interactions of agents with key actors. This paper complements findings by other studies that number of agents is not a sufficient indication of performance, but an effective system needs to focus on the enabling environment for agents to be motivated to work as mandated. In this paper, enabling conditions that are found to be statistically significant are external funding, enforcement of performance targets, systems of rewards and sanctions, mobility to foster linkages, and skills development.
Originality: This paper contributes by: (1) analyzing a cross-section of various organizations and agents to identify factors that explain variations in performance in a statistical and systematic approach; (2) providing insights on how to prioritize investments and options for a fragile state like DRC, with weak infrastructure and institutional capacity and with a long history of neglect for their national extension system; and (3) illustrating how a rich and well-cited conceptual framework can be implemented empirically to provide policy options for a country like DRC.
10 pages., Via open source journal., Farmbook is a novel information communication technology (ICT) tool for agricultural extension that is currently being field tested by the Catholic Relief Services (CRS) in Southern and East Africa. Farmbook enables extension agents to assess productivity and profitability of farming enterprises in a faster and more reliable manner, so as to increase farmer incomes and achieve food security. This study looked at the relationship between challenges faced by extension agents testing the Farmbook application and select socio-economic indicators influencing their work. Specific objectives were to identify and categorize the challenges facing extension agents in the field as they used Farmbook, assess gender differences in the use of Farmbook by extension agents, understand the relationship between socio-economic status of extension agents and the challenges faced in using Farmbook. Data were collected through document reviews, administration of a structured questionnaire and focus group meetings with field agents. Descriptive statistics and multivariate techniques were used to analyze data. The results show that personal and wider socio-economic conditions do have an impact on the proficiency of extension agents using Farmbook. The study goes on to recommend measures to improve the training and ICT proficiency of extension agents adopting Farmbook
