Stakeholders urges Bauchi govt to make extension services accessible to Smallholder women farmers

By Suzan Edeh, Bauchi

The Bauchi State Government has been called upon to make extension service accessible, adequate and timely to Smallholder Women farmers in the state.

This was contained in a community scorecard on Smaller holder women farmers access to extension services in Bauchi state which was presented during a one day Dissemination meeting on the findings on Access to Extension services from the year 2020-2023, Organized by Smallholders Women Farmers(SWOFON) Bauchi chapter in collaboration with Fahimta Women and Youth Development Initiative (FAWOYDI) with support from ActionAid, held at the Bauchi State Agricultural Development Programme(BSADP) Conference Hall, Bauchi.

Daily Independent  reports participants at the one day dissemination meeting are Women farmer groups, Smallholder women farmers, government officials, Civil Society Organizations and the media.

Presenting the findings of the Scorecard, Mrs Faith Adidu, the Agricultural programme Officer in FAWOYDI, said that the objective of the findings was to advocate for improved access to agricultural extension services for smallholder women farmers, engage policy makers at different levels towards increased investment and qualitative spending in agriculture that targets smallholder farmers, particularly women and provide information of smallholder women farmers rating/ scoring on access to agricultural extension services to government officials, the media and public.

 The Scorecard stated that there has been no budget for the provision of agricultural extension services in the capital component of the State’s Agricultural budget over the last four years, adding that the only allocation made was on personnel and office running, which implies that staff being paid do not have resources to do their jobs in providing extension services to farmers based on their mandate.

The findings in the Scorecard further stated that only 16.7% of smallholder women farmers indicated that their various cooperatives accessed extension services from the year 2020-2023, whereas, 83.3% of the respondents stated that they have not accessed any services from extension workers/agents within the past 4 years.

In the area of Accessibility of government’s agricultural extension services to SWOFON in the last four years, the finding revealed that 14% of the respondents who have accessed agricultural extension services indicated that their various cooperatives find government’s agricultural extension services fairly accessible while 33% rated it not accessible, noting that most of the respondents, representing 53%, that have never accessed extension services, indicated that they are not aware as the services are not available to them.

Challenges listed in the findings of the scorecard included poor access to extension services, inadequate female extension workers to support smallholder women farmers in communities whose cultures do not allow for interaction with men who are not relatives, Non-inclusion of smallholder women farmers in agricultural activities in the state, lack of mobility for few extension workers to reach out to farmers at their various locations and lack of budgetary allocation to extension service delivery in the state.

Some of recommendations in the findings stated that government should employ more extension service workers, particularly female to provide services to the larger number in the state, smallholder women farmers should be included in all agricultural activities in the state, government should make provision for mobility such as motorcycle for extension agents to reach smallholder farmers especially women in the rural areas.

Other recommendations are extension workers department should facilitate access to credit for smallholder women farmers to support their farming activities to boost food production and Increased income, government should allocate budget and release funds for extension service delivery in Bauchi state and make budgetary allocation for capacity building for existing extension personnel to enhance their knowledge on modern agricultural practices which they can in turn, pass down to farmers.