Impacts of improved extension services on awareness, knowledge, adoption rates and perceived benefits of smallholder dairy farmers in Pakistan

Abstract

The provision of effective extension services to smallholder farmers across both developing and developed countries remains a challenge worldwide. The objective of the study is to demonstrate the impacts of improved extension services on awareness, knowledge, adoption rates and perceived benefits of smallholder dairy farmers in Pakistan. An extension program was developed and implemented in five districts of Punjab (Okara, Pakpattan, Jhelum, Kasur and Bhakkar) and two districts of Sindh (Thatta and Badin) provinces. The extension program involved the provision of research-based information on a monthly basis to smallholder farming families (FF = 523) over a 4-year period. The extension program was primarily a knowledge transfer-based system, but also relied on farmer engagement and feedback to help drive research and topics for discussion. No financial incentives were provided to the farmers for their participation. A ‘whole-family approach’ was used in the extension program, where comprehensive interdisciplinary training on the whole dairy-farming system was provided to the males, females and children of the farming household. To encourage greater participation and support different learning strategies, several information transfer media were used (including group discussions, one-on-one visits, practical demonstrations, problem-based learning techniques and videos). To assess the impact of this extension program on farms involved, data on farmer awareness, knowledge, adoption and their perceived benefits were collected using a mixed-method approach from three different groups of farmers; registered (IMPreg = 179) farmers directly involved in the extension program, non-registered (IMPnon-reg = 116) farmers indirectly benefiting from the program and traditional (IMPtrad = 104) farmers not associated with any project activities. Overall awareness, knowledge and adoption rates relating to seven different recommendations in the extension program were significantly (P < 0.05) higher in the registered farmers than in the non-registered and traditional farmers. The perceived benefits of the adopted recommendations varied between the different extension messages, but farmers described that they observed increases in milk production, improvements in animal health (body condition and morbidity) and labour efficiency (time savings). These results suggest that adopting improved extension services using a whole-family approach we can significantly achieve higher adoption rates, leading to on-farm benefits to smallholder dairy farmers and their families.

A Participatory Investigation of Bovine Health and Production Issues in Pakistan

“…Recently, Wynn et al (40) reported that the current extension services in Pakistan cover only 40% of small-scale farmers, a majority of which are men who have a minimal role in day-to-day livestock activities and thus lead to poor adoption of extension messages. This is supported by Warriach et al (17) who implemented the whole-family approach (by involving men, women and children) for the extension program in Pakistan and found higher adoption rates leading to better animal health and on-farm benefits. Therefore, a whole-family approach for extension services might be a better approach to educate smallscale dairy farmers about health and production constraints for their animals.…”

“…The productivity of the Pakistani dairy sector is affected by constraints including nutrition, husbandry and health as well as limited access to vaccines and veterinary extension services (16,17). The major bovine diseases/syndromes reported from Pakistan include mastitis, foot-and-mouth disease (FMD), hemorrhagic septicemia, blackleg (or black quarter) caused by Clostridium chauvoei, internal and external parasitic diseases and hemoglobinuria (14,16,(18)(19)(20)(21).…”

Effects of Continuous Adoption of Artificial Intelligence Technology on the Behavior of Holders’ Farmland Quality Protection: The Role of Social Norms and Green Cognition

“…These positive results of CAAIT are likely to form a perception of benefits in holders' minds. Holders will compare the perceived benefits with their expectations and evaluate the value of CAAIT [30]. As a new and effective technology, the perception of the benefits of artificial intelligence technology generally shows a positive trend for holders.…”

Randomised controlled trial on estrus and conception impacts of reproductive and nutrition interventions on Kenyan smallholder dairy farms.

“…In general, smallholder dairy farmers in Africa have experience in rearing animals, but they are continuing to rely on traditional husbandry practices on their exotic-cross cows, such as using bulls instead of AI for reproduction, feeding poor quality diets, and keeping non-pregnant cows on the farm as long as they produce milk, which are likely contributing to low milk productivity and reproduction (Vaarst et al, 2007). In a study that included farmer training methods in Pakistan, substantial adoption rates of new techniques by the smallholder dairy farmers and their families were observed (Warriach et al, 2018). In that study, farmers who adopted the recommendations observed a wide range of positive impacts, including improved reproductive parameters.…”