Social skills for accessing agricultural information among smallholder farmers in southwest Nigeria

Abstract

Access to agricultural information has continued to be a key important issue in the fight for food security. This is as a result of the role played by information to farmers in improving food availability. This study presents the level of social skills possessed by smallholder farmers in South West Nigeria and how it affects access to agricultural information. Mix method approach involving structured interview and focus group discussion was adopted. Result of the structured interview showed that the highest rated mean among social skills is team work (3.27), followed by conflict management (3.16) and the least is oral communication in foreign language (2.70) while focus group discussion revealed that the highest skill is communication in local languages. A logistic regression analysis showed that oral communications in vernacular, entrepreneurial skills influence on others, team work and ability to form network are the five social skills that are significant in predicting access to agricultural information. An important implication is that information should be packaged in local languages and the skills on foreign language among smallholder farmers should be improved upon to enhance access to agricultural information. It is recommended that more conscious effort should be made to improve the level of social skills among smallholder farmers.