Assessment of the Usage of Extension Communication Channels for Disseminating Crop Production Information to Oil Palm Farmers in the Birim South District, Ghana

Abstract

The study assessed the usage of extension communication channels for disseminating crop production information to oil palm farmers in  Birim South District. A sample size of 181 farmers was selected through purposive and simple random sampling techniques. The data  collected were analyzed using frequency, percentage, mean, standard deviation, ordinal logistic regression, and Kendall’s coefficient of  concordance. The results showed that radio, extension agents and colleague farmers were generally the most available communication  channels for oil palm farmers. Radio, colleague farmers and extension agents were the communication channels that the farmers frequently used. Nursing and planting, pest and disease control, use of fertiliser, and harvest and post-harvest handling were the crop  production information mostly sought by the farmers. It was also discovered that the majority of farmers do not get any agricultural  information from farmer magazines, newspapers, or mobile text messages. Sex, level of education and household size were the most  significant factors influencing oil palm farmers' frequency of use of the available/accessible communication channels for crop production  information (p values =0.037, 0.010 & 0.034, respectively). The major challenges affecting the use of communication channels were low farmer-extension ratio, poor signals and the high cost of using such channels. The study recommends that the Ministry of Food  and Agriculture and Non-Governmental Organisations facilitate the establishment and maintenance of farm radio programmes and  encourage more peerto-peer extension among rural farmers.