African Journal of Agricultural Science and Technology (AJAST) Vol. 3, Issue 9, pp. 407-411. September, 2015 http://www.oceanicjournals.org/ajast ISSN 2311-5882 ©2015 Oceanic Journals
Review Paper
The contribution of information and communication technologies to the Ethiopian agricultural extension system: a review of literature on agriculture knowledge management Dereje Derso*1 and Ekuogbe Ejiro2 1
Department of Rural Development and Agricultural Extension, Madda Walabu University, P. O. Box 247, Bale-Robe, Ethiopia. 2 Department of Biochemistry, Delta State University, Abraka, PMB 1, Delta State, Nigeria. *Corresponding author. E-mail:
[email protected] Accepted 12th June, 2015
Agricultural extension is an educational service which brings information and new technologies to farming communities to enable them improve their production, incomes and standards of living. With the problem that extension agents face in facilitating direct contact with farmer clients and with researchers due to the physical distances involved and lack of transportation needed for their mobility, the application of Information and Communication Technologies offers excellent possibilities, for strengthening research extension systems and beyond the urban focus. Thus, for effective and efficient service delivery, the extension services and research organizations need to be appropriately supported with the use of Information and Communication Technologies. In many countries the costs of maintaining full complement of extension agents are increasing progressively while the price of computers in the global market has decreased rapidly. Experts in public and private research and extension system could easily connect, collaborate and established working online and offline platform using the Information and Communication Technologies tools. The experience in Ethiopia rapid development of Information and Communication Technologies, which facilitates the flow of data and information, has tremendously enhanced the knowledge management practice in agriculture. The objective of this paper is to assess the contribution of information and communication technologies to the Ethiopian agricultural extension system and review the recently developed agricultural knowledge systems in Ethiopia. The study is based on a systematic review of existing literature of agricultural knowledge management work in the country. The respite of the paper is organized in four sections. Section II focuses on contribution of Information and Communication Technologies to the Ethiopian agricultural extension system. The third section discusses the forms of Information and Communication Technologies for agricultural extension service provision in Ethiopia. The fourth section examines generation and use of agricultural information in Ethiopia. The findings of this study reveal that the various forms of Information and Communication technology have been used in agricultural service delivery and were more in tune with the circumstances and requirements of smallholder farmers. Key words: Agricultural Extension, Agricultural Innovation, Agricultural Knowledge Management, ICTs, Agricultural Systems. INTRODUCTION Agricultural extension is an educational service which brings information and new technologies to farming
communities to enable them improve their production, incomes and standards of living. With the problem that
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extension agents face in facilitating direct contact with farmer clients and with researchers due to the physical distances involved and lack of transportation needed for their mobility, the application of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) offers excellent possibilities, for strengthening research extension systems and beyond the urban focus. Thus, for effective and efficient service delivery, the extension services and research organizations need to be appropriately supported with the use of ICTs. Van den Ban and Hawkins (1998) argued that in many countries the costs of maintaining full complement of extension agents are increasing progressively while the price of computers in the global market has decreased rapidly. ICT can play a crucial role in benefiting the resourcestrapped farmers with up to date knowledge and information on agricultural technologies, best practices, markets, price trends, and weather conditions. Experts in public and private research and extension system could easily connect, collaborate and established working online and offline platform using the ICT tools. The experience in Ethiopia rapid development of ICT, which facilitates the flow of data and information, has tremendously enhanced the knowledge management practice in agriculture. The objective of this paper is to assess the contribution of information and communication technologies to the Ethiopian agricultural extension system and review the recently developed agricultural knowledge systems in Ethiopia. The study is based on a systematic review of existing literature of agricultural knowledge management work in the country. This paper focuses on the contribution of ICTs to the Ethiopian agricultural extension system, discusses the forms of ICTs for agricultural extension service provision in Ethiopia, examines generation and use of agricultural information in Ethiopia and summarizes the main findings of the study and draws appropriate conclusions. Contribution of information and communication technologies (ICTs) to the Ethiopian agricultural extension system Even though the history of broadcast media in Ethiopia is relatively old, its development has been so slow until the last decade, when the expansion of both governments owned and the private media have been noted. The electronic media, which is still under government ownership, has increased its airtime very recently and also its coverage of development issues has expanded. Radio stations, mainly FM stations, have tremendously increased and the installation of community radio stations is being considered by private and government institutions. These all in one way or another way deal with issues especially related to
agricultural extension and rural development (Kirub, 2008). ATA (2014) notes apart from scientists and researchers, the agriculture sector has a variety of players and stakeholders including farmers, commodity brokers, buyers, extension workers, policy makers and end consumers. Each of these stakeholders has varying needs for, and uses of ICTs, all within the common thread of knowledge and information brokerage and sharing. The most prevalent use of ICTs in agriculture is to provide farmers with information and advisory services. The Forum for Agricultural Research in Africa (FARA) has compiled a comprehensive inventory of initiatives providing such services (FARA, 2013). From the results of the inventory, the basic information needs for farmers are market information prices, weather forecasts, transport facilities, information on storage facilities and information related to crop and livestock diseases and general advice related to agriculture. Using ICTs, the information is provided in a variety of ways: SMS, voice, web portal and call centre. The inventory indicates that several of the information services have been developed in order to provide information in a standard way using question and answer services and that the most popular services are audio or voice based. A newspaper publishing is about a 100 years old venture in Ethiopia. Since then, agrarian news and feature articles are the dominant columns in government owned newspapers. However, to date, several private newspapers include news and feature articles dealing with agriculture and rural development activities in the countries. They also include some crop production guidance in their columns. Several periodicals (magazines, newsletters, and journals) are produced in Ethiopia. In most of government published magazines, agricultural and rural development issues are often in the headlines. As a state owned institution, the Ethiopian Television and Radio and the press agencies have become instrumental in the development activities. This is evidenced revealed in the objective statement which states, “Prepare and present to the public radio and television major and current events taking place within the country and abroad, as well as educational and recreational programs in accordance with media, press and other relevant policies and laws (data from field survey).” The agencies have wide coverage of transmitting agricultural, rural, and pastoral information even beyond the nation (http://www.pressreference.com). Like most media activities, agricultural and rural development information and communication in either print or electronic format is not restricted by any kind of government legislation or policies in Ethiopia. Newspapers and magazines are published and owned by both government and private companies. Because of
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the Press Law of Ethiopia, the government does not control the content and concepts expressed in such publications. The Broadcast Agency of Ethiopia regulates the broadcast media (radio and television). Similarly, telecommunication is regulated by the Ethiopian Telecommunications Agency. The regulatory activity serves to promote a broader communication of agricultural and rural development information and to provide affordable telephone (both fixed and mobile) and Internet services as well as non-IP services such as radio and television (ETC, 2014). Effective knowledge and information management in the agricultural sector were achieved with the right knowledge and information delivered to the farmers and other stakeholders at the right time in a user-friendly and accessible manner. Farmers were involved in the knowledge management process as knowledge generated in a participatory manner and have a greater likelihood of being accepted and acted upon the knowledge. This participatory approach was enabled the integration of traditional or tacit knowledge of farmers with the modern forms of knowledge, and further enhances the utilization of knowledge disseminated to smallholder farmers. Forms of information and technologies (ICTs) in Agriculture
communication
ITU (2009) argues number of challenges in using ICT in agriculture in Africa. The first challenge has to do with how ICTs are understood and perceived. In talking about ICTs there is emphasis on the Internet and associated technologies, leading to a narrowing of the context of ICTs to computers and the Internet. With the current mobile boom in Africa, the context has shifted to cell phones, computers and the Internet. This perception can result in other technologies such as radio and TV being sidelined or overlooked, a critical issue in Africa where half of rural households have a radio and 6% have TV, whereas only 2.6% have access to fixed telephones and 0.38% have access to the Internet. Kevin and Mark (2011) argue radio is the most widely used medium for disseminating information to rural audiences across Africa. Radio can reach communities at the very end of the development road people who live in areas without phones or electricity. Radio reaches people who cannot read or write. Even in very poor communities, radio penetration is vast. There are more than 800 million radios in developing countries. An average of one in ten people in Africa have access to a radio; that translates into a major proportion of households that own radios, given that the average household size is 7.2 people. An AFRRI survey of 4581 households in rural listening communities in countries confirmed that approximately 76% of households own a
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radio Over the years many development initiatives have demonstrated the power of radio to reach rural audiences, both as an instructional technology, and as a participatory development medium. Ethiopia has made significant stride in rolling out infrastructure to various part of the country through Rural Connectivity Project, Woreda Net, Schoolnet and AgriNet, but this has yet to make dent on the flow of indigenous knowledge. Many people still see the Internet as a consumption tool as a means of recreation, information gathering and shopping, but the Internet has been a key resource for exchange of agricultural information. A significant amount work still remains in turning Internet and other technologies around to facilitate the exchange of agricultural information (Tomari, 2008). Generation and use of agricultural information in Ethiopia In Ethiopia, public agricultural extension services have been in action for about half a century. Ethiopia has the largest agricultural extension system in Sub-Saharan Africa, and third largest in the world after China and India (Swanson and Rajalahti, 2010). According to the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation (BMGF, 2010), a total of 8,500 farmer training centers (FTCs) have been established and 63,000 field extension workers (known as development agents-DAs) have been trained. The current extension approach, therefore, follows FTCbased extension system. The FTCs are positioned to facilitate agricultural knowledge and information exchange among researchers, extension workers and farmers. Woreda level agricultural offices are responsible for managing the operation of FTCs with the support of zonal and regional agriculture bureaus and are the frontline administrative structure for implementing agricultural extension services in the country. The experts (called subject matter specialistsSMS) in each woreda provide technical support and training to DAs. Most of the FTCs have at least three development agents one for crops, livestock, and natural resource management. Knowledge management can be defined as the fact or condition of knowing something with a considerable degree of familiarity acquired through experience, association or contact. Knowledge consists of the attitudes, cumulative experiences, and developed skills that enable a person to consistently, systematically and effectively perform a function (William and Michael, 2005). It is an integration of explicit and tacit knowledge. Explicit knowledge refers to all aspects of formal, systematic, recorded, communicated and shared knowledge that is made accessible through a variety of information delivery systems. Tacit knowledge on the other hand is highly personal, created by doing,
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trial, error, reflection and revision. Knowledge is considered as the fourth production factor after labor, land and capital (Lishan, 1999) and is particularly critical in the agricultural sector. Making relevant knowledge accessible to the farming community helps improve production, productivity and brings higher returns. If the agricultural practice of smallholders is not backed up by modern agricultural knowledge and information, agricultural households are likely to remain trapped in low productivity, food insecurity and poverty. In the context of Ethiopia, generating new agricultural knowledge and information and making it available for use by smallholder farmers is important in promoting sustainable livelihoods and reducing rural poverty. Various entities are engaged in the creation and development of information and knowledge. Likewise, several repositories and intermediaries play their role to bring the information and knowledge to the ultimate users. Agricultural knowledge is created from modern and indigenous sources. The modern knowledge is created through scientific research (and therefore it is explicit knowledge) by universities and research institutes. Indigenous knowledge or tacit knowledge, on the other hand, refers to traditional knowledge, innovations and practices of local communities and is developed outside the formal education system. Agricultural information and knowledge created from these sources is stored in various forms before it is disseminated for use. The main repositories of such knowledge in Ethiopia include publications, audio visuals, and websites. The stored knowledge and information is then disseminated to users, such as rural farmers, through intermediaries notably during trainings, field visits, exhibitions, publications, and using traditional forms of ICT (TV and radio), modern forms of ICT (internet, mobile phone, etc), and others. Effective knowledge management is achieved when the right knowledge and information is delivered to the right person at the right time in a user friendly and accessible manner that helps the recipients to perform their jobs efficiently (Gupta and Gupta, 2002). The outcome of effective knowledge management includes
improved productivity and performance of the agricultural sector. Smallholder farmers in Ethiopia as well as elsewhere in the developing world require up to date knowledge and information in order to effectively and efficiently perform their farming practices. The knowledge and information that farmers demand ranges from accessibility of new farming methods, availability of weather forecast and supply as well as price of inputs and outputs, among others. In Ethiopia, various institutions and organizations are engaged in the creation, collection, storing, and dissemination of agricultural knowledge and information. The most notable ones, in terms of having direct linkage with the farmers, are institutes
of agricultural research and the Ministry of Agriculture. Agricultural research institutes are the prime source for the creation of agricultural knowledge and information in the country (Mulat, 2002). The initiative of Farm Radio International (FRI) is one best case in the use of ICT for agriculture. FRI, a Canadian based not-for-profit organization, started its operation in Ethiopia in June 2011. It operates in direct partnership with some local radio broadcasters where it supports them to build the necessary skills to develop content that responds to the needs of local small-scale farmers. In order to provide the radio broadcasters with news and resources that help meet the needs of small scale farmers, FRI produces a weekly publication called Farm Radio Weekly that is delivered to e-mail inboxes every week with free subscription. FRI also prepares and collects agriculture related knowledge and information and produce radio script that is used by the partner broad casters. Conclusion This paper examined the contribution of Information and Communication Technology to the Ethiopian agricultural extension system. A review of literature on Information and communication technology in agricultural extension service provision in Ethiopia during the last twenty year reveals that a range of tools have been used. It is only in recent years that attempts have been made to adopt Information and communication technology to agricultural extension service delivery. Farmers were given different sources of options in using Information and Communication Technology tools in collecting information on technologies appropriate to their specific farming needs and those within their local social, cultural, economic, and political environment. The government organizations have been playing a leading role in introducing and popularizing Information and Communication Technology systems to agricultural extension service delivery. In this respect, the role played by Information and Communication Technology in transforming Ethiopian agricultural system is consummate. The findings of this study reveal that the various forms of Information and Communication technology have been used in agricultural service delivery and were more in tune with the circumstances and requirements of smallholder farmers.
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