Abstract:
This study«was designed to assess the impact of training and visit ‘extension system on agricultural development in Katsina State. A sample of 150 household heads was randomly drawn, out of which 124 responded to the interview, which was carried out in six local government areas within the three zones of the Katsina State Agricultural and Rural Development Authority (KTARDA), namely: Daura and Zango Local Government Areas in Zone I, Funtua and Bakori in Zone II and Dutsin-Ma and Batsari in Zone 111. The data collected in these areas showed an improvement on the production of agricultural products and standard of living of the farmers in the study area compared with the years before the T&V was introduced. The T&V also indicated higher involvement of all the sectors of agricultural developments. The structure and management of the T&V system was moderately adjusted to suit the need of the organization and brought about reduction in the cost of managing extension activities, shortened the bureaucratic aspects of the extension and provided greater involvement of all the sectors of agricultural development. Furthermore, the aggregate farm products in 1991 (year of study) is slightly higher than that ot 1904 (before the T&V was introduced). This might be due to the influence otthe T&V introduced. The study indicated that there were more small-scale producers in 1991 than the 1984. The cost of production was observed to have influenced the farmers’ decision on whether to embark on small scale or large scale production. The awareness, adoption/diffusion rate among the five categories, viz large, medium and small-scale, contact and non-contact farmers in the state was generally high, especially within the contact groups and the large-scale farmers. On determining the impact of T&Vs on agricultural development, the rate of awareness and adoption of six recommended improved seeds of cowpea, millet, maize, sorghum, groundnuts and cotton were considered. Majority of the respondents indicated their awareness by above one-half of all the respondents, while the adoption rate was relatively low in four crops out of the six listed. The awareness rate of maize was indicated by most (98%) of the respondents, with two-third (66%) adoption rate in 1984 as against (65%) in 1991. While cotton was grown by all the respondents (100%) in 1984 with only two-fifth (41%) in 1991 . The women’s participation in agricultural development was generally higher and on the increase especially among the young farmers with the introduction of women’s associations, and Better Life programmes. The introduction of Women in Agriculture (WIA) staff posted to all the blocks within the state for effective coverage, also brought about higher involvement of all sectors among the women folks. The finding of the Pearson Correlation analyses also indicated that the independent variables showed very low contribution to dependent variables. In the whole analyses only six independent variables showed their significant relationship to dependent variables, in the. four different analyses. Both variables contributed directly or indirectly to the agricultural development, and the impact of T&Vs but is sometimes hard to measure. For future research of this kind, better operationalisation of variables should be looked for as there are many of them.
THE IMPACT OF TRAINING AND VISIT EXTENSION SYSTEM ON AGRICULTURAL DEVELOPMENT IN KATSINA STATE
