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    Start Over Subject Term South Africa (Africa, Southern) Subject Term extension communication Subject Term small farms

    1. Information and communication technologies (ICT) towards agricultural development in rural areas: case of smallholder farmers in Umzimvubu local municipality of the Eastern Cape Province in South Africa Authors

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    Collection:
    Agricultural Communications Documentation Center (ACDC)
    Contributers:
    Makaula, Z. (author)
    Format:
    Journal article
    Publication Date:
    2021-05-25
    Published:
    South Africa: Academy of Science of South Africa
    Location:
    Agricultural Communications Documentation Center, Funk Library, University of Illinois Box: 203 Document Number: D12307
    Journal Title:
    South African Journal of Agricultural Extension
    Journal Title Details:
    Vol. 49 No. 1 (2021)
    Notes:
    11 pages., This paper was initiated in order to find the usage and relevance of theInformation and Communication Technologies(ICT) by the smallholder farmers of the Umzimvubu Local Municipality of the Eastern Cape Province in South Africa. A survey questionnaire was then developed to collect the relevant data from randomly selected six villages of Umzimvubu Local Municipality targeting 138 respondents. The questionnaires structure employed both closed and open-ended questions that were administered using a face to face interview, conducted on the sample population in each village. There seems to be a correlation between ICT usage and the economies of scale in agricultural development, where smallholder farmers tend to use less of highly modernized ICT, while commercial large scale farmers use more of the modernized ICT. This disparity amongst farmers is exacerbated in many areas by the differing support systems employed by the public extension services.

    2. Utilisation of mobile phones in accessing agricultural information by smallholder farmers in Dzindi Irrigation Scheme in South Africa

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    Collection:
    Agricultural Communications Documentation Center (ACDC)
    Contributers:
    Holmner, Marlene (author)
    Format:
    Journal article
    Publication Date:
    2021
    Published:
    International: African Journals Online
    Location:
    Agricultural Communications Documentation Center, Funk Library, University of Illinois Box: 202 Document Number: D12100
    Journal Title:
    African Journal of Library, Archives and Information Science
    Journal Title Details:
    Vol. 29 No. 1
    Notes:
    21 pgs., CTs (Communications technologies) have revolutionized agricultural information services at every level in the agricultural sector, thus impacting rural development and catalysing poverty alleviation strategies. This has largely been the case with small-scale farmers in rural areas in developing countries where mobile technologies have penetrated more than most other ICT tools. However, in some of the farming environments, mobile phone use is largely driven by agricultural extension workers. This paper seeks to examine the way mobile phones are used for information access in situations where agricultural extension workers are a critical intermediary in the agricultural information services. Interviews were conducted with 10 randomly selected farmers who were part of the Dzindi irrigation scheme. The findings were that from the variety of information available to the farmers the most important source was the extension officer. The extension officer and the radio were indicated to be the most reliable independent sources of information. The other sources, such as the radio, family members, and friends, suppliers of chemicals, books and magazines, were only considered reliable if the information could be verified or vouched for by the extension officer. Increasing the information handling skills of extension officers, training of farmers to use smart features of their phones and promoting the usual face-to-face communication use of conventional methods, which is what usually gives rise to the mediation of mobile phones, were recommended.