Browsing by Author "Chikezie, N. P."

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    Displaced farmers perception of resource- use conflicts as an obstacle to household food security and food safety in Abia State, Nigeria
    (2019-07) Chikezie, N. P.; Ajaero, J. O.; Akande, S. N.; Chikaire, J. U.
    Conflicts occasioned by different land users have become common place now. When farmers are displaced from their ancestral home due to conflicts involving pastoralists, life becomes difficult and unbearable. This paper investigates displaced farmers perception of resource use conflicts as an obstacle to household food security and food safety. A total of 300 displaced farmers were selected for interview and data obtained were analyzed using mean and standard deviation. Result showed that conflicts create food shortage (M=3.43), destroys food stocks (M=3.57), disrupts production processes (M=3.28), reduced farm investment (M=3.19), among others. Again, during conflict situation, food items are easily contaminated with mean score of 3.27, foods are handled with dirty hands (M=2.58), unsafe water could be used to prepare food (M=3.31), outbreak of food borne illness (M=2.92), poor quality of food eaten (M=3.31), among other reasons. It is recommended that adequate food be supplied to the displaced farmers in the form of aid, water supply be provided to displaced farmers and health facilities put in place to handle case of illness and to avoid spread of illnesses.
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    Extension and advisory services roles in creating resilient value chain of smallholder rural farmers in Imo State, Nigeria
    (2019-07) Chikezie, N. P.; Ajaero, J. O.; Akande, S. N.; Chikaire, J. U.
    Smallholder farmers are most affected by climate change shocks and weather related disasters the world over, and they are also vulnerable to market fluctuations and poor governance, conflicts and even diseases. Extension and advisory services provide an opportunity for strengthening resilience of rural farming households by increasing their access to both material and non material resources. This paper sought to explain how Extension Services Providers build resilience of rural farmers in Imo State, Nigeria. The researcher selected 120 Extension workers and 230 rural farmers for interview. Questionnaire was given to both respondents, and complimented by oral discussion. Data collected were analyzed descriptively. With a discriminating mean (M) score of 2.0, it was seen that climate change affects the farmers adversely. Climate change damages crops in farm and field (M=2.50), reduced quality/quality of crops(M=2.45), leads to sudden death of crops(M=2.70) among others. To build resilience of rural farmers, extension workers promoted the following resilient approaches - diversification of income sources (M=2.81), market information provisioning (M=2.79), behavioural change campaigns(M=2.54), crop diversification (M=2.67), among many others. The farmers face the challenge of insufficient incomes, poor monitoring, low understanding of climate change, resilient options etc.