Factors influencing the use of agricultural information by Vietnamese farmers

Abstract

This study examined the factors affecting the use of agricultural information by Vietnamese cereal farmers. A sample size of 245 cereal farmers was selected and surveyed. The participants were classified into small, medium and large cereal farmers. Descriptive statistics and inferential statistics were applied to analyse the data. The results show that large farmers used information from preferred traders, extension workers, input suppliers, mobile phones and the Internet; smaller farmers employed information from cooperatives, the farmers’ union and television. Large farmers had more access to information on soil preparation, pest/weed control, harvesting, and market and input prices, while small farmers accessed information on inorganic fertilisers. The regression analysis shows that the characteristics of gender, farming experience, participation in training programmes and community-based organisations, access to the Internet and television, information obtained from preferred traders, the Commune Peoples’ Committee, extension workers, cooperatives, the farmers’ union and input suppliers significantly affected farmers’ use of agricultural information (χ2 = 140.784, p < .000).

Information needs and sources used by small-scale horticulture farmers in Morogoro urban, Tanzania

“…Mtega's study recommended that radio stations should increase the number of agricultural programmes to be aired per week, while the government would reduce tariffs associated with the acquisition and maintenance of radio services. This is also adjoined by several other studies (such as Svensson, and Yanagizawa, 2009;Musawi;Kaske, 2020;Hoang et al,2022) that where modern information sources such as radio, television, mobile free short messaging services, social media, farmer's field visit, workshops and training are strategically deployed as they would offer enormous gain for agricultural information transfer.…”

“…Studies (e.g. Salau et al, 2013;Ndimbwa et al, 2019Abebe et al, 2019Ng'atigwa et al, 2020;Hoang et al, 2022) considers use of modern channels such as mobile phones or the Internet to access agricultural information as an important milestone for enhancing agricultural information access by farmers. Unless farmers have information at their fingertips, they will also lose out on market opportunities for their produce.…”

“…It may also be due to failure to access communication media like computers, smartphones and the Internet or information provided by some media like TVs, newspapers, and radio considered of the more national market, and not customized for being relevant to a specific region's farmers' needs . Such inaccessibility significantly affects farmers' use of agricultural information and agricultural development in general (Svensson, and Yanagizawa, 2009;Kaske, 2020;Hoang et al, 2022).…”

Access to Credit and Its Relationship with Information and Communication Technology Tools’ Adoption in Agricultural Extension among Peasants in Rangwe Sub-County, Kenya

“…However, Meena [16] noted that the access level was low among the farmers while some of the farmers were also reported to get less amount of credit. Hoang et al [7] conducted a study and reported that access to credit has the potential to increase the financial ability of smallholder farmers to use ICT tools in agriculture. Although a few who accessed the credit got a small amount.…”

“…Most of the farmers practice farming on a piece of land of fewer than 3 acres [6]. The farmers can easily adopt the novel techniques when they receive the information timely through constructive extension dissemination techniques like ICT tools [7]. The tools refer to a set of technological devices and resources used to receive, store and communicate information.…”