Information and Communication Technology and Enhancement of Agricultural Extension Services in the New Millennium

Abstract

The ratio of extension agents to farmer in Nigeria is very high. More so, most of the agents depend on traditional means of communication to send across time bound agricultural information and research findings to farmers. This is no longer effective in the present dispensation if the farmers must achieve food sufficiency for the nation. This paper therefore, examined the usefulness of information and communication technology in the enhancement of agricultural extension services in Nigeria. It equally looked at the rationale for the use of ICT in agricultural extension services. Some useful recommendations were made among which are that government should embark on aggressive development of rural areas ensuring that electricity supply is regular, the Ministry of Agriculture and ADP should work cooperatively to recruit and deploy more qualified and ICT literate extension agents and the Ministry of Agriculture should invest in training the in-service extension agents and the farmers on usability of ICTs for information dissemination and retrieval.

DOI: 10.5901/jesr.2013.v3n4p155